Horizon Breach
by GBRK
Summary: On May 3, Japan lost thirty thousand players to the Catastrophe. Now, one's come back. Once divided, the worlds of Earth and Elder Tale have been joined, and Akihabara, as always, is at the center of everything. Complete!
1. Chapter 1

**Prologue:**

"Shiroe, where do summoned creatures come from?"

Shiroe paused his work, looking up.

Minori met his eyes from across the room, her own stack of paperwork somewhat obscuring her face.

"I… don't know. Maybe Regan has something on it? I can try asking him the next time I see him."

Minori tilted her head back, pursing her lips, then nodded. "Okay."

Shiroe returned to his work.

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 1**

~oOo~

Roderick had to admit- taking orders from a little girl half his age would have been weird even outside of Elder Tale, back in Japan. Now, as the guild leader of one of his own self-titled crafting guild, it was downright bizarre.

But because that girl was politically well connected and the apprentice to strategist Shiroe himself, he swallowed his pride.

And it wasn't like he could deny his own fascination with the topic.

He fiddled with his pen and clipboard, marking off results.

Fading afternoon sunlight filtered through the windows of the warehouse. The corrugated walls had yet to be painted, and reflected the light for better illumination.

"Horse talisman, level 5, open doors, wolf tribe, summoner!" Minori barked out her order.

His employee cast the spell, and within seconds, the sound of hoofbeats could be heard echoing through the warehouse. The horse that came galloping towards them was the same speckled white and brown mare that had appeared every other time that specific talisman was used, materialising somewhere out of sight beyond one of the open doors before making its way inside.

"Direction?"

The reply was barely audible in the cavernous warehouse, but after a few miscommunications early in the tests, the experimenters had taken to remaining on raid chat with each other.

Minori looked at him, and said "West entrance."

Roderick nodded, and wrote down the result.

The horse was dismissed, and trotted off.

"Horse talisman, level 5, obstructed doors, wolf tribe, summoner!"

The dull scrape of metal against concrete came from each of the four sides of the warehouse, as metal grates were pushed in front of each of the doors.

Again, Roderick's subordinate used the talisman. Again, the same horse appeared.

"Direction?"

"..."

"Disturbance?"

"..."

"West side, undisturbed grates."

Roderick filled in the final box on the page. "Thank you very much, everyone. That concludes testing for today. I'll contact you if we make any immediate breakthroughs, or when need more testing, but you're free to collect your payments from my second in command."

One by one, everyone disconnected from raid chat.

Once he was sure his employees were out of the site, Roderick groaned, placing his hands on his waist and cracking his back. Standing for hour after hour sucked, even with his physiology drastically improved by the transition into elder tale. Still, the only things that held guilds as large as his together were respect of leadership and inertia, and without one the other usually ceased. And if the price to pay for that was standing for hours, then so be it.

"Can I see the notes?"

Roderick handed the clipboard over. This was largely a formality, as they'd been pretty sure of their conclusions by the end of yesterday, but it always paid to have a second eye check over the data.

Paper rustled.

"That seems to confirm it, then. The user doesn't matter to the operation of the talisman, and talismans have to be tied to specific creatures in particular, which get teleported in, always from the same direction relative to the talisman."

Roderick nodded. "With some more experimentation, we may be able to tie talismans to people, so we can teleport them around without having to worry that Plant Hwyaden will shut down the inter-city gates again in a power play."

"But still…"

Roderick grimaced. "I know. We're still no closer to knowing where summons actually come from. But at least we know a lot more about how talismans work. We can still try varying mana input, activating them in magically active areas, having People of the Land use them, seeing what happens when we activate a talisman without tying a summon to them, and that's merely with equipment we can acquire from stores…" As he spoke, Roderick grew more and more animated, the fire in his eyes rekindled.

Minori laughed, cheer returning to her face. "Don't lose too much sleep, though. Shiroe's told me how you get fixated on your research."

"I'm an adult, and can handle myself." Of course, his white hair belied the fact that he was actually in his twenties, but he didn't need to advertise that.

Minori rolled her eyes, but left him in peace. With a quick goodbye, she left for the Log Horizon headquarters.

Left with his thoughts, Roderick casually strolled towards his favorite coffee place in Akihabara. "Hmm, what _does_ happen when we try to use a talisman with nothing tied to it?"

~oOo~

Testing continued for the better part of the month. With no early breakthroughs, Roderick couldn't justify spending all his time on the summoning experiment. Still, a summoner himself, he couldn't fully restrain his admittedly self-interested curiosity.

The preliminary results for testing summon-less summoning talismans didn't seem to do anything, but after testing varying mana input with regular summons, he rapidly returned to testing the unbound talismans.

It had been fairly easy to overlook, really. It was possible to put more mana than necessary into summoning, but because that didn't have any effect on the strength of the summoned creatures, Adventurers simply didn't.

But with some simple observation, it was easy to spot how the more mana was placed into a summon, the greater the glow surrounding it.

From there, it was a short step to conclude that the ineffectiveness of applying more mana into unbound talismans wasn't due to the lack of summon, but due to a lack of mana.

And if there was one thing a guild of one thousand, eight hundred and eighty one people had in abundance, it was mana.

It wasn't long before people started volunteering to help him out. More and more people showed up. Talismans began burning out, but were rapidly replaced.

Visual effects grew more and more pronounced, as the effect of the talisman grew from a brief glow in the air to larger and larger circles, to what could even be referred to as portals.

It took weeks of gathering more and more volunteers, and constant research and development to get more and more durable talismans, but eventually the portal grew to such a size that someone's head could be put through it.

That is to say, the portal grew to such a size that someone put their head through it.

Roderick jerked forward, an aborted motion to stop his guildmate.

But the portal held, and the lab-coat clad dwarf pulled his head back just in time to avoid the abrupt close of the portal as the mana supply went out.

Nearly two hundred Adventurers promptly slumped to the ground, as their mana depletion hit home.

But one look at the dwarf's face, and Roderick was back on his feet, already running towards him.

" _What. Did. You. See._ "

"Cars! A man in a business suit, streetlights, and asphalt instead of cobblestones. I can't tell you what city, but it's definitely Japan!"

Roderick found himself mirroring the dwarf's infectious grin, even as the cheering of his guild nearly deafened him.

~oOo~

Marrielle didn't bother trying to look guarded, like the other guild leaders. As Roderick explained his plans and schematics, she practically bounced in her seat, really more of a throne.

The swankiness of the massive, round meeting hall, with its soaring arches and statues carved into the walls, had taken some getting used to.

She wasn't excited for herself, per se- having been a NEET back in the real world, she had to admit the respect she got in Elder Tale was markedly superior. Still, even the possibility that she could re-unite her young guild mates with their families had her ecstatic.

…"and that's why each talisman will cost about 22 million gold, not including wages for whomever actually assembles them."

Wait, what?

"Excuse me?"

Roderick gave an exasperated sigh, but by now he was more than used to her antics.

"Creating a portal large enough to cross worlds takes a lot of mana, which takes a durable talisman, which takes high level equipment, which takes high-level quests and high level players which themselves need equipment, which requires more quests, etcetera. And of course, getting enough mana to power the talisman will require paying a lot of mages."

Marielle's face fell.

"If it costs that much for a one way trip, it'll take years to get everyone across." Isaac didn't look happy either; his arms were folded across his chest, and in his massive black armour he cut an intimidating figure.

"The situation isn't as disagreeable as you're claiming," Roderick interjected. "I believe we can lower the cost as we research better ways to manufacture items, and it's not exactly single-use: once we have a talisman, simply gathering up enough mana to use it will be considerably cheaper than manufacturing a new one. And I've been discussing this with Shiroe-" Shiroe nodded "-and he says we can tie a sort of reverse talisman to a specific person. The specifics of why it works are beyond me, but they'll be able to move back and forth between the worlds, although their time will be limited."

The other ten guild leaders of the Round Table Alliance digested his words.

"D.D.D. can provide ten million gold immediately, and more given time." Everyone blinked at Krusty's words, not expecting the leader of the combat-focused guild to have so many resources on hand.

"Ha!" Isaac was once again grinning. "We'll match you. We've been looking for this since we got into elder tale, I'm not going to lose out because I was a cheapskate."

The other guild leaders practically fell over themselves volunteering their reserves, and even Marrielle got a little carried away, offering all of the few million Crescent Moon had in reserve, or at least all that Henrietta let her offer. For a second in command, sometimes Marrielle felt Henrietta had more power than she did!

~oOo~

Akihabara's crafting guilds were used to dealing with nearly excessive quantities of money, but even they didn't quite know what to do when handed what amounted to a blank check.

Adventurers _asked_ for tax increases to fund development. People of the Land with too much time on their hands from the introduction of mechanized agriculture found themselves hired in droves just to perform arithmetic and help move crafting equipment around. Dozens of Plant Hwyaden spies were ferreted out, until they were offered the chance to simply invest in the project directly, at which point they funneled a truly staggering quantity of gold into Akihabara's coffers.

Of course, not everything went according to plan. The requisite materials for a talisman powerful enough to transfer an entire person turned out to be even more expensive than expected. Entirely novel mana storage methods were developed in order to obviate the requirement for hundreds of mages to be present at the same time to activate a talisman.

Even Akihabara's internal mana transport system was co-opted.

And as expected of a consensus-based political apparatus, there were politics.

Even gathering the thousands-strong defense force against the goblin king had been less a less contentious question than "who should we send over first."

Lander nobles constantly meddled, attempting to secure their own passage to see the fabled homeland of the adventurers.

Eventually, however, compromise was reached.

The talisman needed to be tied to a specific person, so they could move between realms to facilitate communication.

The ambassador would be a trusted member of one the Round Table Alliance's guilds, as they had provided the bulk of financing for the project.

The ambassador would be female, because Adventurers were scary enough for being immortal and imbued with magical power; hopefully, a woman wouldn't be seen as as much as a threat.

By the same token, the ambassador would be (or at least look) young.

And finally, because they were relatively neutral, the ambassador would be from Log Horizon.

Minori repeated these reasons to herself in a sort of mantra. She was the obvious choice. Among other things, she had the original idea that sparked the portals, she wasn't a combat class, so she could show off without being threatening, she was well-respected among Adventurers, she was- she was-

Minori's breath caught. She was _completely and totally unprepared, why did she agree to this instead of insisting Akatsuki or Tetra do this, this was a terrible idea, why why why-_

Shiroe held out the contract, and, with shaking hands, she signed it. Why couldn't she focus! She had fought monsters with more composure than this. Why was she so anxious about returning home temporarily?

Why was she so anxious about seeing her parents again?

She really hoped the observers packed into the small room, kept as a rarely-used ancillary meeting place by log horizon, didn't notice her all but quaking in her sandals.

"There, it's done."

Huh? The contract was torn apart- and some part of her brain reminded her of the rather obscure bit of trivia that that had been done in the past so that two people could each keep one half, which could be compared in order to determine validity. Which didn't make sense in this case, because she wasn't making a contract with anyone else, just-

Minori squeaked as the lighting changed from the lanterns of the guild building's bowels to the blinding intensity of midday sunlight, and she fell on her butt in the middle of a crowded shopping district.

~oOo~

A/N: Thanks to egolagoon, for betaing this chapter (and giving me the impetus to help fill up the LH section), as well as the reddit users ulyssessword, gommm, and PeridexisErrant for helping me polish this chapter.

A brief note on Japanese customs: because I'm writing for a western audience, I'm not going to include honorifics, except in tangential references. I'm also leaning on the side of not enough bowing, because it slows down the text. Japanese turns of phrase will also be avoided.

I'll be releasing chapters weekly on sunday, at least until my backlog is exhausted.


	2. Chapter 2

~oOo~

last edited: 5/14/16 (spelling error)

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 2**

~oOo~

Minori was painfully aware of all the curious glances she was getting. At least she was in a modest skirt and blouse, rather than her elaborate Kannagi robes.

Making a conscious effort to look embarrassed (which, admittedly, wasn't hard), she rubbed the back of her head and said "whoops, I'm so clumsy."

Hopefully, people would just believe they'd been seeing things, and not that she'd really fallen out of a portal. Alerting everyone from the fact that she just arrived from another world would be one way of getting the government's intention, but she didn't want to inadvertently start a panic.

Which would be a pretty inauspicious start to her mission, given that she was evidently in the middle of a crowded shopping district, mid-rise buildings festooned with advertisements and brightly colored posters in every direction.

No, the plan was actually pretty simple- she'd find her parents, _then_ explain everything.

So when a kindly middle-aged woman helped her up, she screwed up her courage, bowed, and made her request.

"Excuse me, but I'm very lost. Could I please borrow your cellphone to call my parents?"

The woman blinked, seemingly a little surprised, but smiled at Minori and pulled her phone out of her purse.

"Of course, sweetie!"

Minori's gut clenched at the fear that she'd forgotten her Dad's cellphone number, but thankfully, phone numbers are designed to be easily remembered. The ringing seemed to stretch on forever, so when her father's sonorous voice said a quiet " _hello, this is Daiki Yamashita, who's calling?_ " she nearly cheered.

"Hi, dad. It's me, Minori. I'm back."

"... _w-what?"_

"I'm at…" she covered the receiver and looked at the women, silently asking for her location. With an amused look, she listed off the location.

"I'm at Kotobukiya, near the Kanda river." Minori made sure to include some other details, just in case. "I'll explain as soon as you're here. Love you, bye."

Minori returned the phone to the woman, and gave a heartfelt thank-you.

She waved it off. "No problem. I need to wait until my daughter-in-law finishes shopping before leaving, so I'm not in a rush. I'm Chugisa, but you can call me granny." The woman grinned, well-placed wrinkles and a rounded face giving her a matronly look.

Minori gave a short laugh. "I'm happy to make your acquaintance!"

"Now," the woman leaned in conspiratorially. "Can you tell me how you came out of nowhere? You may have gotten everyone else fooled, but not much gets past this old biddy."

As she was looking at a reflective window, Minori had the pleasure of seeing how rapidly her face became blank.

Well, she had never intended to keep her origin secret for long, and with a reaction like that, she couldn't exactly claim that the woman hadn't seen anything. Plus, she would feel pretty bad lying to her.

Still, she wanted to keep the secret at least for a little while, and it wouldn't exactly be promising for her plan to fall apart literally minutes after her return.

She chose a compromise, tapping her nose. "It's kind of a secret, but you'll find out in a few days if you watch the news."

"Oh, a mysterious one? Well-"

She stopped talking, as sirens approached.

The screeching of tires cut off her sentence, and a black car made a sudden stop in the middle of the road.

Bystanders stepped back, cellphones coming out.

Two armed men came out, each with a holstered pistol at their sides.

Minori gasped.

She ran.

Straight into the arms of her father.

"Daddy!"

"Minori!"

Her eyes were tightly closed, but she could imagine the look of disbelief on her father's junior partner's face by the sheer quantity of swearing he did under his breath.

"It's been two years!"

"I can explain, just not here."

They broke apart, and her father nodded. "Okay. I've called your mother; we'll bring you to Motofuji Police Station. Where's Tohya?"

"Safe."

As she entered the car, she made sure to wave to Chugisa, who waved back, laughing.

~oOo~

Daiki barely paid enough attention to the road to avoid crashing. Two years. Two years without his children, not knowing what had happened to them, whether they were dead or alive or, as he saw suggested by TV talk shows all too often, abducted by aliens and experimented on.

As soon as they were moving, Minori launched into her explanation.

"-and Shiroe- that's the player I told you helped me and Tohya out when we were newbies- let us join his guild when we asked. Me, Tohya, and three of our friends (two from our guild Log Horizon) actually took a journey across a lot of Japan- which took less time than it would have because the world of Elder Tales is at a one-half scale from the real world (although Roderick said his scientists figured out it was increasing in size)- and participated in a bunch of quests while Isuzu (she's our bard) toured around playing the song she composed because the Landers only had the forty two songs from the game's soundtrack to play-"

Daiki had to marvel at the transformation his daughter had undergone. Not physically, because she looked nearly-identical- even after two years- aside from a change in clothes and a change in haircolor.

But behaviorally? She wasn't the shy girl she used to be, afraid to speak her mind.

She was definitely his daughter, of course, and not an imposter, because he recognized all her little ticks and odd little verbal inflections. Still, this was just… well, unbelievable would be putting it lightly.

"-so we took a raid group to the TV broadcasting tower because this hyperintelligent monster- we call them geniuses- had put nearly everyone to sleep by draining their mana, and also because we thought we'd be able to connect back to this world. That didn't work, but we did somehow manage to talk to Shiroe's friend Kannagi who was in China, and we found Krusty, the leader of that big fighting guild, who'd somehow been teleported across continents. After he came back things settled down a lot, except for Plant Hwyaden's occasion interference- they basically rule south Yamato, and would probably like to rule north Yamato too- until Roderick started experimenting with mount-summoning talismans and when we got one finished I was chosen as the first person to be sent through, and that's basically why I'm here."

Daiki glanced, nonplussed, at his daugher. He glanced back at the road, suddenly swerved to avoid hitting a car, then glanced back.

In the background, he could hear his partner Fumihiko chuckling under his breath, as he recorded the conversation on his cellphone.

"So just to make sure I got this right, you're immortal, your brother can walk again, and you've been chosen to represent every person who disappeared in Japan."

"Pretty much, yeah."

Daiki couldn't help the smile that spread across his face, his mustache bristling against his lips.

"I still don't understand what happened, but I understand enough to be proud of you."

~oOo~

Motofuji Police Station was a squat, russet brown four story building with a row of windows that wrapped around the structure on each level.

It had taken another ten minutes for Minori to meet with the station commissary, after making a tearful reunion with her mother.

The man ran a hand through his greying hair as he eyed Minori's staff, which was producing a simple Fox Light.

Minori hadn't had much use for the spell, to be honest: with Serara's druidic capabilities giving her multiple Fox Lights and Rundelhaus's brighter Mage Light, her mana was better kept in reserve. Still, it was such a simple, crucial spell that it would have been almost criminal to _not_ learn it.

"Was that enough to convince you, or would you like to see another one of my spells?"

The commissary shook his head. "I won't lie: I _would_ like to see some more demonstrations of your capability, just to be sure. But I trust your father, and this entire situation is just so preposterous I can't help but think it _is_ true." He folded his hands. "Now. What's your plan?"

And wow, wasn't that a weird feeling. She'd gotten used to command in Elder Tale, regularly trusted to lead mid-sized raid groups on Round Table Council business, but Elder Tale's average age had been fifteen, prior to the Catastrophe (even though it had been primarily the older, more invested players playing on midnight when the update came out.) Having someone who, in any other situation, she'd be referring to as -sama, treat her as an equal felt a little bizarre.

Still, she was being trusted with a lot, and had to represent the Round Table Council well.

"We're not trying to keep that we've found a way back home a secret, but at the same time, I don't want to cause a panic before I have a chance to pass on the full story to the cabinet. I can stay here for about another three hours, but then I'll be brought back to the guild hall because of the limitations with the transportation equipment we're using."

Minori gesticulated with her staff, searching for words.

"Ahh, so I'd be honored if you could contact your superiors on our behalf, so I can get to the news spread as quickly as possible," Minori finished.

The commissary nodded. "Does magic show up on video? Having evidence will make it much easier to get taken seriously."

"I don't know; we didn't have any digital cameras. But there's no reason why it shouldn't, so it can't hurt to try."

The commissary nodded, and, in a display of what Minori decided was eccentricity, activated the camera on his smartwatch rather than pulling out his phone.

Minori cast a simple Fox Light to begin with. Then she summoned a Purification Barrier and the slightly-improved Protective Barrier on her left and right respectively. After some consideration, she cast a Prayer of Recovery on the commissary, who jolted as he felt suddenly rejuvenated.

"Anything else?"

The commissary tapped the screen of his smartwatch, ending the video capture. "No, that should be good. What was that last spell?"

"It's a minor healing spell; Adventurers like to use it to wish good luck or show encouragement."

"Well, I'm glad you used it! I feel great! Well." He smacked his palms on the table, pushing himself up. "I have a few calls to make and emails to send. You can talk to your parents while you wait." He walked to the door of his office, ushering her out with a bow and a smile, before closing it.

~oOo~

Nao Yamashita had always held out hope that she'd see her children again.

But when she laid in bad, failing to go asleep, what-ifs tormented her.

What if they'd been through some horrible ordeal, left broken after it?

What if they resented her and her husband for failing completely and utterly at even beginning to find them?

What if, like all parents feared, her children had simply grown up, and no longer needed or wanted her?

But Minori put those fears to rest.

Listening to her chatter, Nao knew her daughter had done some growing up. But she was the same sweet little girl she always was, and the year and a half spent in Elder Tale evidently hadn't changed her much physically. And wasn't that interesting? Nao had been expecting _some_ changes. But then again, she had been something of a late bloomer herself.

Her cheeks hurt from how often she had laughed at the tale being told by her daughter, and she had constantly met her husband's disbelieving looks over the small, square dinner table in their house.

The experience was marred by the fact that Tohya wasn't there with them, but the picture Minori had given Nao of her "guild" had put to rest her fears about her little boy.

And to think- magic, not medical science, had given him the ability to walk again!

Her husband had heard a heavily abridged version of Minori's story earlier, but the details had left him stunned. The stupid look on his face as Minori described the all-out battle against hundreds of wyverns took her back to the day he proposed and she said "yes."

But three hours passed quickly. As the time for her daughter to return approached, they took a few pictures and printed them off. A tearful hug goodbye, and then all that was left of their daughter's temporary return was the photograph of her and her friends.

Nao looked at her husband. With a glance, both knew they had a sleepless night ahead of them, hoping that their daughter would be back.

~oOo~

The other members of Log Horizon, save Shiroe, were crowded around Minori, listening to her story. Akatsuki idly listened, as she perched on the roof of Log Horizon's guild house. The mood was festive in Akihabara, as Adventurers celebrated the success of Minori's trip to the "real world," and people of the land celebrated because everyone else was.

Paper lanterns lit up the street, and even from here she could hear indistinct conversations and yelling.

But wasn't calling it "the real world" a misnomer? To the petite assassin, the world of Elder Tale felt just as real as the one back home. She had family she wanted to see, of course, especially her little sister, but here she was widely respected, and even possessed a degree of notoriety as Shiroe's-her lord's- personal ninja. Back home, she was just a short college student that looked well below her age.

As she heard the bell chime that indicated a voice connection, she dismissed her train of thought.

"Akatsuki."

"My lord."

"How many times have I told you not to call me- ah, never mind. Can you activate your teleport to the city gates? The council meeting is finished, and I need to brief you."

"Of course my lord." Akatsuki smirked. She knew how much it needled him to have her act so formal, but she had grown rather fond of her roleplaying persona, to the point where it was effectively the same as her actual personality.

She activated her menu, and chose the option to teleport to the city gates. With the city's mana system down after the incident with the rogue city guard that ability had been temporarily out of commission, but the crafting guilds had restored partial functionality to the city's services literally centuries earlier than the sage of Miral Lake had predicted.

A flash of light, and she was gone.

Shiroe stood in his customary robes, staff in hand.

Akatsuki dropped to one knee, bowing in front of Shiroe. "I am at your service, my lord."

Shiroe cast electrical fuzz, its bright light and buzzing sound filling the clearing. He leaned in and pretended to speak in Akatsuki's ear while at the same time surreptitiously handing her a folded sheet of paper.

Hiding it in her armor, Akatsuki stood up.

Shiroe nodded. "Dismissed."

Akatsuki used her unique overskill Shadow Lurk to throw off any would-be observers, illusionary duplicates leaving in every direction.

That had been rather uncharacteristic of Shiroe- had he simply wanted total secrecy, he could have summoned her to the guild hall. Perhaps he needed a rapid response? But if so, why use written instructions, when he could have simply given the order verbally, after telling Akatsuki to find a private place to listen to his message?

She opened the letter.

"Plant Hwyaden plans to effectively send an additional agent without our knowledge over to the real world by having a small summon carried by their guild member we agreed to send over when they agreed to assisting with funding. Then the summoner will be able to use the Soul Possession skill to control their summon remotely, leaving them capable of inter-world communication... We need you to root out the spies they have in the city."

Now Akatsuki understood. With that little bit of theater, Shiroe would have flushed out her prey, forcing them to try and go into hiding. It looked like she'd be putting her tracker subclass to use.


	3. Chapter 3

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 3**

~oOo~

 **Welcome to the BattleSpace Online Message Boards**

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 **Topic: A resoluition to the Elder Tales Online mystery?**

 **In: Boards ► General Discussion ► News**

 **Rock_Steady_Aim** (Original Poster)

Posted on September 12, 2019:

This video got posted by a japanese police station last night: link

(Well, last night for us yankees, anyways.)

Is it a hoax?

More details are coming; the japanese seem to be taking this pretty seriously.

 **(Showing Page 1 of 1)**

► **Ulysses~S**

Replied on September 12, 2019:

It better not be. I've already bought stock in japanese airlines.

► **_Charles_**

Replied on September 12, 2019:

What? This could herald massive advances in science, and you're investing in airlines?

► **Ulysses~S**

Replied on September 12, 2019:

How many people do you think are going to go to Japan to see this happen, or hoping to get to the adventurers first? Tourism is going to spike like crazy.

► **KentClark**

Replied on September 12, 2019:

He's got a point, _Charles_.

Well, he would, if this wasn't clearly a hoax.

► **GoodNamesWereTaken**

Replied on September 12, 2019:

kind of hoping its real. i wonder what its like on the other side?

► **Watching_Watchers**

Replied on September 12, 2019:

GoodNamesWereTaken

I don't know about the other side, but people are having some weird reactions here. None of the of the major religions have made a statement, but I've heard about a few priests and imams contradicting each other about whether it's gay for men to date genderbent female avatars.

► **7456398521**

Replied on September 12, 2019:

Watching_Watchers

Has anything even been confirmed about that? It could just be like SAO where everyone gets returned to their real-life appearance.

► **Watching_Watchers**

Replied on September 12, 2019:

7456398521

Not exactly, but there have been a few side-by-side comparison pictures of what "Minori" looks like now, what she looked like a few days before the disappearance, and what her avatar looked like.

The fact that her Avatar was based on her confuses things, but she definitely looks more, uh, conventionally attractive. God, do I feel weird saying that about a fourteen(?) year old.

Incidentally, it looks like one "major" (for certain values of major) religion has made a statement about this- the Scientologists are claiming the Adventurers are proof that they are exactly, literally correct. I don't think this is going to end well.

 **End of Page. 1**

More useless speculation (well, and the one guy actually speculating).

Goddamit.

Back to hitting F5 over news sites it was.

At least the timezone differential meant that it would be a reasonable 7pm in the afternoon in New York during the Japanese morning when the girl had promised to come back.

But given that this was all happening in the Yamato server, they almost certainly wouldn't have anyone that knew his brother, though.

Michael sighed, and closed the tab, getting up for a trip to the bathroom.

In the process of Thinking Deep Thoughts, as he called these breaks, he wondered: if magic was real, then maybe he could try to perform it as well. What was the translation for the girl's spell? Fox Light? That looked pretty simple, he guessed. He didn't have a clue about how he'd find a staff, but maybe (hopefully) he didn't necessarily need one.

~oOo~

To Minori's relief, she appeared back where she had last been, her parent's dining room. The police had accounted for the possibility that her entrance location would be tied to the direct analogue of where she left in Elder Tale, but this was still far more convenient.

Her parents were already waiting for her, and she gave them quick hugs before turning her attention to the two men in suits in the back of the room.

One stepped forward.

"We'll be driving you to the Kantei, where you'll be able to speak to the Prime Minister."

The Round Table Council had hoped she'd get a chance to speak in front of the Diet, but Minori was honestly shocked even just by how quickly she'd gotten the attention of the Prime Minister. She had known having a father that worked for the government would be helpful in being taken seriously, but had dramatically underestimated the impact it would have.

"Of course."

"Wait." Everyone in the room looked at Minori's mother.

"Have you had breakfast yet?"

Minori blinked, then laughed. "Yeah, I had a Crescent Burger earlier today."

Her mother and father smiled, recognizing the term from what Minori had told them yesterday.

The two men kept their faces blank, but the one that had identified himself as the driver moved to open the door, and all five exited the room.

Minori automatically fell into step behind the other four, used to working from the back of groups.

Through her windows, she could see a massive amount of people. The cacophony of the crowd only amplified as they left the house, and they were almost immediately accosted by reporters.

Her first instinct was to duck her head and hide behind her parents, but she quashed it. She was representing every Adventurer in Yamato, and it wouldn't do to not behave with dignity.

As they made their way towards a large black SUV, a cordon of police keeping their way clear, she had a sudden thought. Whenever she watched the news, politicians and actors liked to ignore the media and go "no comment, no comment" whenever a reporter asked them a question, but it's not like she had anything to hide. (Well, besides Rundelhaus's status as a person of the land turned Adventurer.)

"Wait." Her parents looked towards her, as did the two men in suits. She turned towards a small bunch of TV reporters.

"I don't have a lot of time, but I actually can answer a few questions."

The reporters stopped, surprised that she had actually decided to pay attention to them. Taking advantage of that, a man in the crowd shouted "What happened to the NPCs in Elder tale?"

"They're just normal people now- just like everyone else."

Quickly over their surprise, the reporters started shouting their own questions.

"How is the relationship between former NPCs and the Disappeared?"

It took a little while for Minori to realize the "Disappeared" meant the Adventurers, although she managed to respond promptly because she had been mentally preparing for the question.

"We work closely together with them. Krusty, from D.D.D., organized a force of over a thousand Adventurers to fight the goblin king when they were threatened." Hopefully that would put any fears about Adventurers not emphasising with non-adventurers to rest.

"Are adventurers really immortal?"

"More or less. It's actually possible to stop Adventurers from respawning, but only the largest groups- like the Akihabara Round Table Alliance or Plant Hwyaden- can do it, and I know the guild leaders in the alliance and they're nice people." She decided to provide an example. "Actually, the Round Table Alliance was running out of money, so my guild leader Shiroe ended up negotiating with the clan that controls Yamato server's money supply by using how Adventurers don't die when we're killed to get all of Yamato's territory purchased."

Hopefully, that would put fears about family members dying to rest. And as a bonus, Shiroe got to make a good first impression! Maybe people would stop calling him the Villain In Glasses once they realized he had their best interests in mind.

"Can you show off your magic?"

"Sure, although that'll be the last thing I can do." Minori cast a Purification Barrier, waved, then resumed her walk back to the SUV.

She strapped herself in as the car started, an entourage of similar SUV's surrounding it.

It would be approximately thirty minutes to the Kantei, depending on traffic.

Minori spent that time answering some of her parent's questions. They'd been rather overwhelmed the previous day, but now had a voracious appetite for any information they could get on what she and Toyha'd been up too.

It took a little bit of doublespeak, but she managed to successfully dodge their questions about whether she'd found a "boy she liked."

One of the stone-faced men eventually cracked, and even asked her some questions himself. Evidently, one of his nephew's friends had been transported to Elder Tale.

She didn't recognize the girl's name or username, unfortunately, but because Elder Tale's starting locations had been based on a player's real-life geographical location, if the girl had been a new player, she'd have started in Akihabara, so Minori promised to look into her when she could.

After being waved through the security checkpoint, the motorcade parked in the Kantei's garage.

This time, Minori walked in the front and center of the group. Ascending the steps out of the enclosed garage, Minori remembered the time she'd seen this building class trip. The year and a half she'd spent in Elder Tale was such a divide in her memories from her everyday life prior, it felt more than a little surreal to be back.

"Hello, I'm Gen Nakatani; I was chosen to be prime minister after the Disappearance, so you may not have heard of me."

Minori bowed. "I'm pleased to make your acquaintance, sir. I'm Minori, ambassador of the Round Table Council."

As the Prime Minister greeted her parents, she gave a cursory look around, before doing a double take as she noticed the prime minister's floating nametag had a level other than "one" listed under it. So the prime minister was a level six samurai? That was interesting. Now that she thought of it, she vaguely recognized his name as a former prime minister's minister of defense.

"Now, if you and your parents will follow me, I'll lead you to my office."

"My parents won't be coming."

This earned Minori quite a few surprised looks. She elaborated. "I'm overjoyed at seeing them again, but we're going to be discussing a matter of national security. I'm not at liberty to divulge some of the things I've been told to the general population."

The prime minister gave her an evaluating look. "I see." He gestured of one of his bodyguards. "Then please, Mr and Mrs. Yamashita, make your way to the lounge, and enjoy some refreshments."

Her parents badly looked like they wanted to argue, but their ingrained respect for authority kept them quiet. Minori did catch a few saddened looks as they left, however, and felt bad that she couldn't have them by her side if she wanted to be taken at all seriously.

She followed the prime minister into his office, and both sat down on comfortable couches across from a small, round table.

The prime minister's face was still jovial, but gained a somewhat more serious cast, as he asked his first question.

"So from your explanation, I've gathered that adventurers 'respawn' when they die. What exactly does that entail? Does that mean that you can guarantee the safety of all the Disappeared?"

"The simple explanation is that if an Adventurer dies, they re-form with some experience and equipment penalties back at the cathedral in the last major city they visited. But what we've found out is that losing experience means that you lose some of your experiences. Adventurers in raiding groups who die relatively often report some memory loss. I've only died a few times, but I can't remember, for example, whether my neighbor had a dog or a cat for a pet, or the face of the physician I saw when I was little."

The prime minister looked concerned, so Minori elaborated.

"It's nothing serious, at least for me- I remember all of my family and friends, and I haven't died often. But while I can guarantee the physical safety of most Adventurers, I know there are some extremely reckless ones with fairly severe memory loss. Because Adventurers see this world again for a brief period after death, there was a unit of Plant Hwyaden I met that ran headfirst into fights to constantly die."

The prime minister's frowned. "You mentioned earlier today that there was one known way to kill adventurers."

"Well, we don't know if it actually kills them, but it's possible to buy structures, and specifically the Cathedral, and then set their permissions so they exclude particular Adventurers. The Round Table Alliance hasn't had any reason to do so, but Plant Hwyaden purchased their Cathedral quickly, then executed a few people known to have done some pretty serious crimes against the People of the Land to solidify their power. I don't think they've done that to anyone since, though."

The prime minister mulled over her words.

"But you would say the majority of the people are safe, yes?"

Minori nodded.

The prime minister paused again, marshalling his thoughts. After that confirmation, his face had returned to a more neutral state. "Then, can you explain the political situation of Elder Tale's Japan?" He pulled out a tablet, and opened to a picture of Elder Tale's Yamato server map.

Pointing to the relevant locations, she said, "there are two rival Adventurer factions. Plant Hwyaden controls Minami and Nakasu, and is closely allied to the Holy Empire Westlande. They're a single guild that forces any Adventurers in their territory to join them. The Round Table Alliance directly administers Akihabara, and is a coalition of eleven guilds. In addition, the guild Silver Sword is closely allied to the Round Table Alliance, and keeps the peace in Susukino. The Akihabara Adventurers are on good terms with the League of Freedom Cities Eastal."

"Actually, Princess Lenessia of the League is scheduled to be the first Lander to cross over to this world."

"Lander? Is that what you call the former NPCs? And I'm surprised you're on such good terms with the native royalty."

"Well, 'People of the Land' is what they call themselves, so Lander is just an abbreviation of that. We've been on good terms with the League's government since Lenessia asked us for help against the goblin king's invasion, and we provided a little more than a thousand volunteer Adventurers to assist them."

"So you've dealt with an invasion? That's impressive. Did you participate?"

"I was too low-level at the time to participate in the general defense force, but me and my friends helped fend off sahuagin- fish monsters allied to the goblins- long enough for the People of the Land that were living in a seaside town to evacuate."

"Hmm." The prime minister looked at her as if seeing her in a new light, then gave a short laugh.

"That's impressive, that so many would meet the call to arms. There wouldn't be any way to turn the rest of us into adventurers, no?"

"N-no?"

The prime minister's gaze intensified. "Hmm? There is some way?"

Minori kept her mouth shut. She had one secret she really needed to keep, and she basically blew it within minutes of meeting her first politician? She'd been so sure everyone would underestimate her, but it looked like she had somehow managed to underestimate the prime minister.

"I see. I assume you have a good reason for being so cagey, and I won't ask why you're keeping it secret, for now. I suppose that means I won't be casting magic anytime soon, though."

Seizing on the change of subject, Minori spoke. "Well, you won't be casting magic, but that's because you're classified as a samurai."

"I'm sorry?"

"You're a level six samurai- you can't switch classes once you've decided on one."

"How in the world did I get to level six?"

"I recall that you were in the military, sir. It looks like that experience applied retroactively, although non-adventurers have a penalty for leveling up."

"Fascinating. Is there anything you could teach me about my samurai powers, then?"

Minori met his smile. "If you had a sword on hand, maybe."

"Actually…" The prime minister stood up, and grabbed a sheathed katana from a display on his wall.

Minori blinked. How had she not noticed that?

"Can I inspect that weapon, please?"

"Of course."

Minori appraised the weapon. Her skill at appraisal was really quite low, but evidently this sword's history was well known. "This sword was a gift by the shogun to one of his retainers during the early Tokugawa shogunate. It's an low-artifact tier production class item."

"And that means?"

"If you hit things with it, they'll break."

The prime minister chuckled. "So, what do I do?"

Minori stood up. Trying to think of a low-tier Samurai Class skill, she pulled out her staff from her magic bag.

Demonstrating the motions with her staff, she said "alright, I'm going to teach you how to cast a Samurai's challenge. It's pretty simple, just take your weapon, and brandish it in front of you, with the intention to make people pay attention to you. It'll draw aggro. You shouldn't need to actually draw the sword."

"It's that simple?"

"Yep."

"Okay." Grinning, the prime minister held the sheathed sword in front of him, then brought it down. "Ha!"

Minori stumbled, as did the Prime Minister's guards. A bright light came from the sword, and Minori was overwhelmed with the sudden urge to punch him in the face. It quickly passed, however, and Minori regained her wits.

The prime minister's massive grin wouldn't have been out of place on a greeting card.

"Well, if I had any reason to doubt that you were really an Adventurer before, I certainly don't now!"

~oOo~

"Shiroe fell for our bait."

"Hmm?" Nureha's languid pose contrasted sharply with Indicus's manic energy.

"Akatsuki is exhausting herself chasing our spies. They won't notice the forest for the trees, now that they're so focused on the idea that we'd sneak across a summon."

Nureha hummed, brushing one of her tails.

Indicus watched her for a reaction, then made a frustrated sound. "Useless whore. I out-manipulate Shiroe and you don't give a single damn. Fuck this and fuck you.

She grabbed Nureha's wrist and squeezed, trying to inflict pain. Nureha gave her a blank look.

"Just remember, harlot, who the real power behind Plant Hwyaden is."

Indicus stormed off, slamming the door behind her.

Nureha continued grooming herself in the dark.


	4. Chapter 4

~oOo~

Log Horizon © Mamare Touno

This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978

Last edited: 6/13/6: Minori's conversation with her parents

Chapter 4

~oOo~

Soujiro darted forward.

"Votive Sword, Kogarasumaru!"

Deep within his bones, he felt the sword resonate, as he summoned its avatar.

With a primal scream, he narrowly dodged the ice giant's enormous wooden club as Tarutauruga of the Fourth Prison activated his guaranteed OHKO attack.

The air trembled, and Soujiro felt the shockwave of Tarutauruga's club hitting the ground, leaving an impact crater in its wake.

In a show of his impressive reflexes, he used the giant's own arm as a springboard, vaulting himself into the air.

Soujiro had based this body on himself. He had the same messy black hair, the same sub-par height, and the same above-par facial features.

But the capabilities were simply incomparable.

Before, he had trouble running a mile in under ten minutes, largely because of his MMO addiction.

Now, he effortlessly arced backwards, vacuum slashes dealing minimal damage to the raid boss, but gathering hate to himself and away from his casters.

From the other side of the room, he heard a sudden roar.

Heat from a blast wave hit him like a physical force as Ibura Habura laid waste to the territory surrounding him. The double headed serpent writhed as it used its Banquet of Merciless Purgatory, and the six-man mixed cleric, druid, and kannagi party were forced to cast emergency healing spells to prevent deaths and the necessity of using mana-intensive resurrection spells.

The scorching temperature took a sudden nosedive, as Tarutauruga used his White Night ability. Soujiro's reaction time slowed, and the ice giant smashed him across the battlefield.

But the abilities don't overlap, and the healers are able to switch their focus towards aiding the West Wind Brigade, while Silver Sword resumed their offensive against Ibura Habura.

In the eaves of the massive cavern, the fourth six person party fended off shadow vanguards. Even though Ruseato was kept trapped in the anterior cavern by virtue of its massive size, it still assisted its fellow raid bosses by inflicting self-harm in order to activate its ability to spawn minions.

It was a careful balancing act, keeping the two raid bosses on different sides of the cavern. Adventurers had to constantly relocate in order to stay in range of the healers and out of the range of the raid bosses' area of effect attacks, while at the same time making sure each raid boss was thoroughly focused on only one corner of the cavern.

Still, this was hardly the first time Soujiro had participated in a raid, or even this particular raid.

The battle continued, a constant back and forth as the two elite combat guilds hung on by the skin of their teeth against the combined forces of three raid bosses.

But the strategy initially devised by Shiroe held, and they eventually succeeded in reducing the towering monsters into iridescent bubbles.

The pile of loot left behind was nothing short of staggering, but the hundreds of thousands of gold weren't the reward they were looking for.

"Did one drop?"

William Massachusetts nodded.

"Finally!' Soujiro cheered, along with the rest of the adventuring party.

It was a lot of work for a single artifact-class reagent, but for a cause like going back home, it was worth it.

~oOo~

He couldn't perform either the Kannabi or Samurai techniques that had been caught on video.

Because they were Japan-specific-classes.

Wow, he felt like a moron.

He also felt rather envious of the Japanese cosplayer who had been able to perform the Samurai's Challenge technique the Japanese prime minister had demonstrated.

But at least that confirmed that people could figure out how to do techniques on their own, without having to be taught by an adventurer.

And getting equipment, at least for the non-mage classes, wouldn't be difficult, now that it was confirmed any old sword would work.

Not that he had any lying around, unfortunately.

So, what could he do with that knowledge?

Michael got up from his computer chair and started quietly pacing. The size of the room constrained his motions, and he made small, tight circles on the cluttered floor.

It felt like the gears that should have been turning in his head were stuck together with a thick, viscous substance. He knew he should have gone to sleep hours ago, but he'd been trying for so long he'd hate to give up. And anyways, he probably still had way too much nervous energy to go to sleep.

What he needed was some sort of manual or walkthrough. A wiki, or a UI to tell him what to do. A user interface! That was it!

Remembering Sword Art Online, he stood still and swiped two fingers down to the right. No dice.

Blinking twice and karate chopping the air likewise failed.

He performed a variety of other motions, before giving up, at least for the moment. He searched the internet for images of Elder Tale's UI, but it simply faded onto the screen.

Now that he thought about it, there wasn't any variety of center button that was neutral- all had the symbol of the player's class on them. And character creation of course came before any other part of the game. What if he simply needed to choose a class and subclass?

Well, which one did he want to be?

After some thought, he settled on becoming a medicine man- it was North America's unique class, and Michael figured healers tended to be in demand anyways.

Again, no dice.

At this point, he was almost ready to give up, at least for the night. Then, he had a brainwave. After character creation, and before starting the tutorial, characters spawned into the game. What he needed was starting equipment.

What did he have on hand that could qualify?

A broom, to be used as a staff?

A kitchen knife?

He had to admit, he was rather starved for options.

Then, he remembered- his grandfather's brass knuckles!

Slowly opening the door of his room so as not to disturb his sleeping parents, he made his way through the apartment.

The brass knuckles were in a dusty box at the bottom of a closet. They were illegal here in New York, but so was murder and that hadn't stopped anyone.

He put them on.

Immediately, energy suffused his body. With adrenaline coursing through his veins, he successfully activated the user interface by merely thinking of it. With a glance at the brass knuckles, a readout popped up.

"A young scrapper's weapon, this set of knuckledusters are for when the chips are down."

He resisted the urge to activate a skill in the middle of the apartment, and instead slipped on his shoes and grabbed his keys.

He took the stairs down rather than the elevator to work off some of his energy.

Walking to the blind alley on one side of the building, he made a few test punches, while looking through his list of skills.

He psyched himself up.

"Tiger stance!"

Energy radiated off of his body, and the alley was briefly illuminated.

He rapidly ran out of mana and collapsed onto the ground.

Michael felt simultaneously fantastic and terrible at the same time, elation from having succeeded at his goal warring with the total bone-deep exhaustion he felt.

And this was just at level one!

Though that posed something of a problem: without a supply of monsters, he had no clue how to raise his level, and at this point, his ability was more of a party trick.

Maybe he should fight crime.

...Nah.

~oOo~

Minori had managed to successfully extricate herself from the grasp of the press.

The nonstop barrage of questions had been exhausting, and they'd often brushed up against the subject of turning ordinary people into Adventurers.

It was… it was a topic she knew she (and by extension, Log Horizon) had to address eventually. It's not like she or Shiroe didn't want anyone but Rundelhaus becoming an Adventurer. The only known way to do so, however, required not the difficult to obtain, but possible to grind artifact class materials, but instead phantasmal class materials, where there was a hard limit on how many each server contained.

Shiroe had slowly gathered additional reagents by buying them- after all, there wasn't anything suspicious about a high-level scribe buying even the highest level equipment- but it was rare that someone was willing to sell phantasmal class items.

With her remaining thirty minutes, however, Minori had better things to do than mull over what would best be discussed with Shiroe anyways. Namely, tracking down the contact information of her friends' relatives and sending them brief messages assuring them their children (or nieces or nephews or siblings) were OK.

Crescent Moon and Log Horizon had taken a joint photograph, which she took a picture of with her mother's phone and uploaded to the simplistic webpage she'd set up for the Round Table Alliance.

"Hey there, sweetie."

Minori looked up, and returned her father's smile. "Yeah?" Her parents had been acting a little- just a little- frosty after she told them they couldn't meet the prime minister with her. It was perfectly understandable, but it still made her uncomfortable.

Her parents, standing, traded a look.

"Well, we were thinking-"

"Your father and I-"

Both spoke simultaneously, then cut themselves off. Something unspoken passed between them, and her father took the lead.

"Ahem. Well, your mother and I were discussing this earlier, and you haven't had any formal schooling since you were brought into Elder Tale, right?"

"No." Minori did not like where this was going.

"By the time this Elder Tale Business sorts itself out, you'll be old enough to enter high-school. It'll take a lot of cramming, but I doubt any high school would deny you entry, even with two years of junior high missing."

"I'm not attending high school."

Minori's parents had probably expected reluctance, but they evidently hadn't accounted for the possibility of a flat refusal. Her mother's lips pursed, and her father recoiled slightly.

Her mother sighed, and her face returned to a more neutral expression.

"Minori, you've grown a lot more responsible since the Disappearance, but you'll miss out on a lot if you don't choose to go to high school. We're not saying that you need to go immediately, but in the future, maybe."

"I have a job. I'm trained as a party leader and scribe, so I help the Round Table Alliance administrate the Akihabara Adventurers," Minori justified her choice a little petulantly.

"But Elder Tale doesn't have many people actually trained, in actual schools, to do accounting, or lead military forces. I'm sure you and your friends have done a great job, but it's just not sustainable." Her father was beginning to look a little frustrated.

"A lot of Adventurers were college students, or had already graduated. Shiroe was working on his master's degree, and he taught me a lot about what he learned getting his bachelor's in engineering."

"But he-"

Minori's mother placed her hand on his father's arm, and he cut himself off. She leaned forward, with the same expression she gave Minori when she was in elementary school and bedridden from a cold.

"We don't want to be rude, but… Shiroe, well, we don't think he's a good influence on you. We know you respect him a lot, but you yourself told us that he gets called the 'Villain in Glasses.' He's manipulative, and we're not sure it's in your or Tohya's best interest to keep associating with him."

Minori stopped herself from making an angry outburst, as her mother continued. "But you've done a lot of growing up. Can you tell us why you trust him so much? We haven't been through what you have, and perhaps we've misjudged him."

She hadn't wanted to tell her parents about Hamelin. In fact, since they'd been freed by Shiroe, her and the rest of Hamelin's captives had avoided discussing the guild as much as possible.

But her loyalty to her guild leader overrode her desire to not pick at mostly-closed wounds, and she told her tale.

"Shiroe's always had a soft spot for new players. When we were first getting acquaintance with the game, Shiroe used this feature called the mentor system to purposefully lower his level to ours, so we could be in the same party safely. He taught us the basic mechanics, and how to play our classes. That was before the Catastrophe."

She briefly cleared her throat, then resumed speaking, voice softer than before. "After we were transported into elder tale, we didn't know what to do. Me and Tohya had each other, but we were still new players, and didn't have much else. So when a guild called Hamelin offered us a chance to join them, we did."

She continued, explaining how Hamelin had forced their new players to craft materials for the guild, and were trapped inside the guildhall, unable to escape. How they'd gone on overleveled quests, and died over and over. How they'd been effectively slaves, their agency taken away by the controls the guild leader had set over the guild hall.

How Shiroe, in a masterstroke, both freed them from Hamelin and created the foundations for the Round Table Alliance, by outright buying the guild hall.

By the end of her explanation, her parents were hugging her, and she felt tears rolling down her cheeks.

"But that was a long time ago." She wiped her face off. "I have friends I can trust, and a guild at my back."

"I understand. Here." Her father handed her package. "It's a history textbook. We'll leave the decision about going to high school to you and your brother, but promise to at least consider it."

"I will." Minori smiled at her parents.

"We have about three minutes left," noted her mother.

"Then let me tell you about the time I got called in to deal with a man in a pink bodysuit dancing in the middle of an intersection." Her dad grinned, and launched into his tale.

Minori's cheer had been mostly restored by the time she was dumped back into the Akihabara guild hall.

"Ugh, I feel ready to go to sleep."

"That's silly! It's not even noon. I bet you haven't even had dinner!" Tetra's cheerful face took up Minori's entire field of view.

"Aah!" Minori stumbled back.

"C'mon, c'mon, c'mon!" Tetra practically dragged Minori out of the room.

"Wait, I need to brief the Alliance!"

"Then make a telepathic call and do it! There's an event going on, and you won't want to miss it."

Minori pulled her arm away from Tetra, but kept pace alongside the pink haired guy-turned-girl.

"Event? What's happening?"

"You'll see!"

Tetra sped up, and Minori did the same to match her. Buildings flashed by, their Adventurer physiques preventing them from feeling truly exhausted. They avoided any collisions largely because the city was suspiciously abandoned, rather than any lack of clumsiness on Tetra's and Minori's part.

It started as a barely-visible glimmer, but as they got closer to the city outskirts, it became clear that there was an iridescent dome surrounding the city, as if Akihabara was trapped in a bubble. Adventurers and People of the Land were moving through it freely, however, so it wasn't some sort of magical barrier.

"What is it?"

"The fairies have graced us with their presence! Now I, Galaxy Idol Tetra, with your help, will-"

"You're here. Good." Shiroe casually interrupted Tetra. "We believe the remains of the large-scale magic we've been performing has gotten concentrated enough to make Akihabara a sort of pseudo-dungeon. The effect will fade, but we've been fighting off low-level elementals for the past hour or so. They're not particularly dangerous, but if we let them get too close to the rest of the city the property damage won't be fun to deal with."

"Got it. What should I do?"

Shiroe pointed. "Tohya, Serara, Isuzu, and Rundelhaus are about a kilometer that way. Coordinate them."

Minori accepted his raid invite.

And to think, she had been ready to relax for the rest of the day.

~oOo~

A/N: Check out realitydeviant's "Relocation". It provided a fair part of the impetus for me to post this fic.

Many thanks kenshin8671. DaystarEld, and Mizu25 for informing me of the spelling and grammar mistakes of the previous three chapters


	5. Chapter 5

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 5**

~oOo~

Shiroe pushed up his glasses.

"With that bit of theatre Akatsuki and I pulled off, Indicus should believe we've fallen for her ploy, too focused on chasing down her summoners to realize Nureha plans to disguise herself as the Plant Hwyaden delegate we agreed to send." The other Alliance leaders nodded. "That leaves us with the initiative, and with the debacle with the magic overload yesterday, we even have a justification for pushing our timetable back, so we can spend more time preparing any plan we come up with."

"Of course, that leaves us with the problem of deciding what our plan is." Krusty had a wry smile on his face, as the massive blond guardian leaned back into his chair. His padded armor made little sound as he shifted in place.

The council hall fell into silence,

Marrielle spoke up first. "Indicus was a Debauchery Tea Party member, so you should know her pretty well, right?" Shiroe nodded. "Well, what do you think she's going to do with Nureha out of the way?"

Shiroe thought for a moment. "Most likely? Sit tight and re-consolidate her power. Having Nureha back on earth will allow her to kill two birds with one stone. Plant Hwyaden's image and influence will improve because of their willingness to send their charismatic leader in their stead, while we chose a middle schooler to represent us. At the same time, Indicus will be able to reverse the effects of Nureha taking a more assertive role in leading Plant Hwyaden instead of being a malleable figurehead."

"But they won't take overt action here in Elder Tale?" This was Eins, the elfin guild leader of the combat guild Honesty.

"No. Indicus relies on having a figurehead to disguise her own actions. That doesn't rule out that they'd take action back on earth, however. Plant Hwyaden was an extremely large guild even before the Catastrophe."

"Ugh, I hate politics." Isaac cracked his knuckles, which was an impressive feat considering his massive, bulky armor and equally bulky gauntlets. "So what you're saying is, we need to send the leader of a large, well respected guild over to counterbalance her."

Krusty blinked.

"Why are all of you looking at me?"

"You _are_ the leader of a large, well-respected combat guild," said Isaac, some humor evident in his voice.

"I've barely gotten back from from my involuntary 'vacation'," and here Krusty made air quotes, "on the China server."

"You're on really good terms with Princess Lenessia, and she's scheduled to go through the next time we create a portal," Marielle chimed in.

"Henrietta and Rieze are her friends as well."

"And Soujiro's out grinding, so you're the most attractive man in Akihabara." Nazuna had a vulpine grin on her face, befitting her Fox Tail race. She was sitting in Soujiro's customary spot as his temporary substitute. "No offense, Shiroe." She easily ignored Akatsuki's death glare.

"And regardless," she continued, "your guild is the most used to functioning without you. We lose comparatively little and keep up parity with Plant Hwyaden, which gradually gives us the advantage so long as we control all means to and from earth."

"That's not going to last forever," pointed out Shiroe.

"You'll think of something, strategist. You always do."

Despite Krusty's continued protest, the other guild leaders moved on, considered the matter effectively settled. They began negotiating the fourth and last person who'd go through on the scheduled departure date.

~oOo~

Shopping for panties had to be Tetra's favorite thing about being turned into a girl.

Sure, the new and interesting genitals were OK, she guessed, but people who'd changed genders were almost mundane, in this day and age.

Panties, however, still had something strange and illicit about them.

And of course, they aided her in her favorite pastime- teasing Naotsugu.

But despite the impression someone might have gotten from noticing how completely blasé she acted about the changed gender, Tetra identified as cisgender.

She just happened to be the sort of person who was completely comfortable in their own skin- so comfortable, in fact, that her preferred gender was whichever one she happened to be.

She had a transformation potion, of course (what self-respecting veteran wouldn't?) but just didn't feel the need to use it.

To her, the Catastrophe had been one big opportunity, and oh boy had she capitalized.

Which brought her train of thought right back to panty shopping. She hummed to herself, browsing the shelves of the shop at high speeds, as the cashier gave her strange looks, both for her eccentric dress and eccentric actions.

But she knew she'd have a decision to make soon. She loved her family back home, and they'd have trouble recognizing her if she kept this form. Ah, well. At least the production guilds were working on mass producing copies of the previously limited transformation potions. Wouldn't that be fun?

~oOo~

With the younger members of the guild out on a quest, Tetra shopping, and Naotsugu, Akatsuki and Shiroe at the Alliance meeting, Nyanta felt he was entitled to some "me time."

So he did what he did every time one of these rare blocks of time were available.

He closed the doors and windows, shut the blinds, took of his clothes, then sat in the middle of his room.

Crossing his legs, he closed his eyes, stopped breathing through his nose, plugged his ears, and indulged his fantasy.

For the next ten minutes, he was human again.

No fur rubbing against the inside of clothes, no digitigrade toes, no massively improved senses.

No improved reflexes, no instinct to twitch at unexpected stimuli and fling himself into the air.

He loved being a werecat, he really did. But if given too much time to think about it, or not enough time to wind down from interacting with his frequently fractious guildmates, the awareness of how much his new body was just subtly _wrong_ could be stretched to the breaking point.

It was funny that the Race of Ritual understood the best out of the the other races what werecats went through. Physically, they were nearly identical to an ordinary human. But Roderick had described the strong affinity ritualists had for magic as almost a sort of synthesasia. He tasted cooldowns on abilities, going from salty to sweet as they approached usability. The interaction of buffs and debuffs, even those outside of physical range, gave him the same impression as watching sunlight dapple across leaves.

The Wolf Fangs and Fox Tails had some nonhuman features, of course, but their internals remained much the same.

Those stuck as an alternate gender could use transformation potions, but for "game balance reasons," there had never been a race-changing item implemented.

Nyanta sighted, opening his eyes. That had been a pleasant break from his regular schedule.

But, he reflected as he put on his clothes, he had work to do.

Busy, busy, busy.

~oOo~

Minori had been expecting the interview to be a lot scarier, to be honest.

The prime minister was one thing, but TV was an entirely different ballgame.

Knowing that she'd be in front of a live studio audience, on top of tens of millions of live viewers as she was broadcast internationally and streamed online had had her obsessing for most of the day, to the point where her performance in the quest she'd taken with her guildmates had been negatively affected.

But by the time she actually reached the stage, she was tired enough from the long day to be feeling mellow, and the host hadn't tried to rip her apart like she expected.

She hadn't needed to worry about what to wear, because they had specifically asked for her Kannagi robes, and it had been a huge confidence boost knowing that, as a result of the Catastrophe, her features were more even than they used to be. She was lucky that even Elder Tale, with its graphics iteratively improved over two decades, didn't really bother with facial asymmetry.

Her father had been called off to deal with an incident about thirty minutes ago, but her and her mother had decided to get ice cream. She'd changed back to more ordinary clothing, and with her hair pulled back into a bun, she wasn't yet famous enough to be instantly recognizable.

Or she had thought.

Because a tall man, wearing a mask and gloves was rapidly disabusing her of that notion.

Having a serrated knife blade stuck unexpectedly into your stomach tended to do that.

~oOo~

A/N: Thank you Mizu25 for corrections!


	6. Chapter 6

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 6**

~oOo~

An adventurer's HP bar didn't literally represent their level of healthiness. At one hit point, they didn't perform any worse than at ten thousand hit points.

The exact mechanics were poorly studied, but instead seemed as if HP represented a type of magical energy that automatically healed an adventurer's wounds- it replenished over time, and could be restored by healers, but should it fall to zero, that adventurer would cease to be sustained.

This was, incidentally, why classes and races with high MP had low HP, and vica versa- a simple tradeoff in energy.

Shiroe had told her it was his belief that an adventurer could theoretically fight on after they hit zero hit points, but that whatever governed the respawn system chose to avoid the possibility of permanent harm and quickly despawned them.

As such, the knife buried hilt-deep into her stomach didn't significantly hinder Minori's ability to act.

That didn't stop it from hurting like a bitch.

But even as a rear-echelon support class, Minori wasn't unused to pain.

So when she sunk to her knees, it was a calculated act.

He mother was screaming, and the man was ranting about something called "thetans" and how he'd "prove the non-believers wrong" and some unfamiliar western religion. Bystanders panicked.

She discreetly pulled her staff from her bag, stood up, and walloped him on the head.

She wasn't one of the combat classes and her staff had significantly sub-par damage output.

That didn't stop her from trouncing her would-be assailant in a single blow. She was level 74, and he was level… 4?

Anyways, the point was that it wasn't even a contest.

He collapsed, slumping to the ground.

She didn't take out all of his HP, softening the blow. But when he tried to get up, she pointed her staff menacingly at his face.

"What was that for?"

Minori was uncomfortably aware of how many people were staring at her. This was not a good impression to make.

And of course, her ice cream had fallen to the ground, making her rapidly worsening mood even blacker.

So of course, as the man restarted his incoherent rambling, the crowds of Tokyo were suddenly replaced by the inside of the guild building and the face of her guildmaster.

Wait, what?

Hadn't she had a little over forty-five minutes left?

Shiroe immediately started briefing her, giving her no time to gape.

"Eins, guild leader of Honestly, has betrayed us. Because Plant Hwyaden promised to move his guild members back home faster than we could by leveraging their massive player count, he had one of our portal talismans removed from the guild building and handed over to them. That's not the problem. The problem is that, in the process of Plant Hwyaden trying to preempt us acting and send an agent over, a Genius type monster pushed their chosen ambassador out of the way and went through themselves."

A cold pit formed in Minori's stomach, overriding the residual pain from her assault. Most of the Geniuses to endanger Akihabara had been handled by other parties. But she had been on the Shibuya raid, where they'd narrowly defeated, with twenty four people, a single Genius that had nearly taken down all of Yamato.

"I'm not asking you to fight them alone, of course. We'd already decided on sending Krusty, and Shoryu, Kanami, and BologneseMaster are able to go as well."

"...and who? And don't we only have two portal talismans available?"

"BologneseMaster is from Silver Sword; he's the shortest Adventurer I know, so we can fit him in alongside Shoryu. Now," Shiroe pushed his glasses up, "our plan is as follows. They'll be arriving in Japan at the same place you did, but we can't afford the time it would take for you to meet up. Instead, everyone will immediately mount griffons and fly south, with the hopes that you can find the Genius before they cause too much damage."

It was a surprisingly simple plan, considering Shiroe had made it.

"I don't have a gryphon whistle to summon one with, though."

"That's not a problem. Here." Shiroe handed his own whistle to Minori. "Keep it safe."

"I," Minori gripped the talisman tightly. "I will."

The return to Akihabara was less disorienting, now that she was expecting it.

It had been about three minutes, by her estimate.

"Minori, what-"

Minori interrupted her mother by blowing the whistle. "I'm sorry, but this isn't important right now."

Minori knew she was being excessively curt, but she couldn't afford to waste time.

She could be brought back and forth with the talisman, but only had a limited amount of time on earth each day- much like she could only get four hours of use out of the gryphon.

The crowd startled at the gryphon's piercing call.

Minori scrolled down her friends list. She'd never had a reason to friend Krusty or Kanami, but she'd been in Crescent Moon with Shoryu until she'd asked Shiroe for entrance into Log Horizon.

His name was dark, like everyone else's.

She fed the gryphon some apples from her magic bag, as she adjusted its tack. The bag wasn't an inexhaustible storage space, of course, but she'd found it was useful to have something to keep gryphons pacified when Log Horizon's senior members brought theirs out.

Shoryu's name started glowing, and she immediately activated voice chat, slipping on the gryphon's back as she did so.

"Shoryu, where are you?"

"Crowded shopping district, no clue where."

"Is there a shop called "Kotobukiya" nearby?"

He paused, likely to check his surroundings, then gave an affirmative.

Minori stopped her end of the telepathic call to apologize to her mother, then ordered the gryphon to fly.

In a few powerful and obviously magic-assisted wingbeats, the gryphon broke roof level. She didn't have a clear idea of exactly where she was going, but her friends list let her see Shoryu's general location, and gryphons weren't exactly difficult to spot.

She made her way barely above the top of the mid-rise districts, prioritising speed over height.

The sheer speed at which the gryphon traversed Tokyo's massive urban sprawl surprised her. Streetlights seemed to blur, and she noticed traffic slowing down whenever she passed a busy street.

She idly wondered if this was what it felt like to be a superhero.

Getting the exact location of Shoryu coincided with finally hearing an answering shriek to her gryphon's call. Krusty was on his own gryphon. Her wolf-eared former guildmate Shoryu was, to her surprise, sitting behind an impressively short felinoid rather than on his own gryphon. Minori supposed it made sense- Crescent Moon didn't undertake their own raids, but Silver Sword was one of the two most elite combat guilds on the Yamato server.

Two friend requests and a party invite popped up, and she accepted them.

Krusty spoke through party chat. "Plant Hwyaden opened their portal about two hours south and west from the guild hall by horse. Geniuses tend to head towards population centers, so we'll be able to intercept the monster in about fifteen minutes. I want your gryphons to fly above me in a stack; if we get attacked, I'll take the least damage from an emergency discount."

Minori and BologneseMaster assented, and maneuvered their mounts into position. Shoryu hung on for dear life, looking rather green.

Krusty didn't distract them from their search with idle chatter; Minori knew his leadership experience matched or surpassed even Shiroe's, and she had no doubt he had already memorized the capabilities of each class.

But despite their efforts, they couldn't find the Genius.

Instead, it found them.

~oOo~

Krusty dropped onto the street intersection like a meteor, cracking pavement and sending water spewing from a ruptured fire main.

It would have been an impressive landing, if it hadn't been the result of his gryphon unceremoniously dumping him as soon as an attack so much as rustled its feathers.

He got up, his massive red war axe in position to guard against attacks.

The upside was that there weren't any cars around; he'd evidently found himself in a closed off shopping district.

The downside was that he was in a closed off shopping district, and the place was absolutely packed with easily damaged and decidedly not immortal bystanders.

From ground level he couldn't spot the monster, and the glimpse he caught of it earlier suggested it was approximately man sized.

But neither of those things posed a problem to a tank.

He let loose an earthshaking bellow, giving everything he had to using the ability War Cry.

Against players, abilities that purely drew aggro were nearly useless- no matter how much hate he would theoretically have, players attacked whomever they wanted. But Geniuses, while eerily intelligent, were still non-sapient monsters.

Knocking bystanders out of the way, the Genius sprung towards him.

Its original disguise had been of an unassuming japanese woman, with short hair and a bright yellow summer dress. But its eyes were rolled into the back of its head, and it moved with a bizarre, uncoordinated gait.

That wasn't to say it wasn't fast.

But it wouldn't be fast enough to evade Krusty's axe.

He swung.

"STOP!"

He halted mid-swing, and the monster ran into him, dealing… negligible damage?

"Notice of Exorcism!"

A bolt of white light smashed into the monster, and she collapsed.

Krusty checked her readout.

Wait, level one? This couldn't be the Genius. But that meant…

Minori spoke through their telepathic link. "The Genius is converting people into monsters. It started running as soon as we got close."

His party members ran towards him.

At his feet, the woman had opened her eyes, looking at him in a mixture of fear and awe.

"I see." He paused to survey the crowd. "How many people has it converted?"

"In total? I don't know. But all the ones in the area ran towards you when you used War Cry."

"Did anyone see where it went?"

Shoryu spoke, saying "I saw a disturbance heading towards the highway, about three blocks and a half from here. It wasn't moving particularly fast."

"I see." Krusty paused to think. "BologneseMaster, scout for the Genius. Minori, summon your gryphon again; stay in the air and Notice of Exorcism anything that needs it. Shoryu, back her up."

Shoryu looked dismayed, but all three complied. As Minori called her gryphon, BologneseMaster rapidly scaled a building, and Krusty ran towards the direction Shoryu had indicated.

His feet thudded against the ground. With his Adventurer speed and enormous blue-gold armor, he moved less like a human and more like a locomotive. The crowd parted before him, giving him a clear path to where he wanted to go.

"Target spotted, boss. Take a left two blocks from now."

Krusty grunted in acknowledgement.

He slowed down to take the corner, bleeding off some of his momentum, but was rapidly back up to speed.

"Where is it?"

"Hold on." A pause. "Here!"

Krusty saw the felinoid leap from the top of one building, striking downwards at a cloaked figure.

A withered hand smacked him away, and the felinoid smashed through a shop window on the other side of the street.

The figure turned towards him, dropping a young man onto the ground as it did so.

For a moment, Krusty saw an elderly, caring grandmother. Then, its skin turned translucent, revealing the creature's bones and internal organs. The sclera of its eyes became black, and the monster's pupils became an incandescent yellow.

"Sᴜʙᴍɪᴛ. I ᴡɪʟʟ ɢʀᴀɴᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴊᴏʏ ᴀɴᴅ ᴇɴʟɪɢʜᴛᴍᴇɴᴛ."

Its voice hit Krusty like a physical force. It wasn't loud, but while the monster spoke, all other sounds were muted, and he found his focus inexorably drawn to the Genius and its revolting anatomy.

His charge was prematurely aborted, and it took all of his willpower to even remain standing.

Krusty threw up.

~oOo~

A/N: many thanks to Mizu25, my new beta!


	7. Chapter 7

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 7**

~oOo~

Minori's gryphon suddenly rolled, tucking its wings in.

Shoryu and Minori, in their surprise, failed to hold on and were thrown from its back.

In movies and anime, a fall seems to take forever, dragging on long enough for characters to have extensive flashbacks and shout dramatically.

In reality, it takes a little under two and a half seconds to fall ten stories.

Shoryu, given the chance, would have spent that time screaming.

But Minori, remembering the overskill possessed by West Wind's Nazuna, quite literally prayed as she cast a Purification Barrier.

An orange, holographic disc appeared under them.

They bounced.

She cast a Protective Barrier, and the experience repeated itself.

She chained these two similar spells, switching from one to the other to give time for their cooldowns to pass.

By the time the pair made it to the ground, they had taken a minimum of collision damage, compared to simply suffering the fall.

As she pushed herself up, she could hear Krusty yelling in party chat about how BologneseMaster had about twenty four seconds before the Genius released its area of effect attack again.

In retrospect, Minori decided, she should have dismounted as soon as she saw the kneeling bystanders.

At least she knew the maximum range of the attack, though.

Shoryu, happy to be back on land, had his game face on.

"Minori, I'll give you a piggyback ride. I'm a lot faster than you are."

Minori's instinctive reaction to a rather roguish Swashbuckler offering to giver her a piggyback ride would have been to blush and argue, but now wasn't the time for that. She assented, got on his back, and he began running.

Swashbucklers weren't as fast as Monks or Assassins, and they didn't have the strength of Samurai or Guardians.

But Shoryu was still a far sight faster and stronger than her, and they covered the space of two city blocks in under thirty seconds.

She dropped off of Shoryu, and immediately started casting defensive barriers on the beleaguered Krusty and BologneseMaster.

Krusty kept the Genius's attention while BologneseMaster attacked from the sides and behind.

Viscera stained the street.

Krusty brought his war axe down over and over, but the monster's frail appearance belied its fearsome strength. And like everything else with an HP bar, the only fatal attack was the one that brought it to zero.

Shoryu made a move to assist Krusty.

"No! Get back!"

Shoryu stopped.

"Sᴜʙᴍɪᴛ. I ᴡɪʟʟ ɢʀᴀɴᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴊᴏʏ ᴀɴᴅ ᴇɴʟɪɢʜᴛᴍᴇɴᴛ."

Minori and Shoryu fell to their knees, an oppressive feeling overwhelming them.

They threw up.

Krusty stayed standing, gamely deflecting the monster's blow.

BologneseMaster jumped back down from the building he had taken cover on and re-entered the fight.

"Every thirty seconds," Minori whispered to herself.

Despite everyone having seemingly shaken off the monster's effects, Krusty informed her that each member of the party was now subject to an unknown, but steadily progressing status effect. By his calculations, she and Shoryu had about twelve minutes before succumbing to it. BologneseMaster had four. Krusty had two.

She cast Notice of Exorcism on Krusty.

"The status effect stayed, but it's progressing slower," Krusty told her.

Twenty seconds until she could cast Notice of Exorcism again..

"Shoryu, close in! Minori, focus on buffing him!"

Krusty commanded, and they obeyed.

Shoryu exploded forward.

The monster turned to face him.

"Anchor Howl!"

Krusty glowed green and forced the monster to focus on him.

Shoryu darted in, dual swords puncturing the monster's vitals.

Enraged, the Genius turned towards Shoryu and attacked.

This activated Anchor Howl's secondary effect.

With magically boosted speed, he smashed the flat of his axe into the monster.

The axe made the same sound as hitting meat with a rolling pin, and the Genius was thrown like a ragdoll across the street, hitting a lightpost so hard it bent.

Fifteen seconds until the Genius used its primary attack.

To add insult to injury BologneseMaster chose that time to activate Deadly Dance, hitting the downed Genius with eight consecutive strikes over as many seconds, each strike leaving a more distinct glowing trail as the damage multiplied.

While he did so, Minori cast Notice of Exorcism on BologneseMaster.

"Sᴜʙᴍɪᴛ. I ᴡɪʟʟ ɢʀᴀɴᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴊᴏʏ ᴀɴᴅ ᴇɴʟɪɢʜᴛᴍᴇɴᴛ."

Minori weathered this attack better than the last, if only because her stomach was already empty.

"The effect of Minori's spell has been reversed." Krusty's voice was grim. "I have a little more than thirty seconds left."

Krusty had some time to act, but Minori knew the monster's attack would be completing the status effect the next time it happened.

They had a significant health advantage, but she could guess what the status effect would do, and believed their health advantage would soon be more of a hindrance than a benefit.

Krusty, evidently, had the same idea.

"Shoryu, BM, switch your focus to damaging me!"

Neither looked happy about it, but complied with their party leader's order.

Krusty activated the ability of his Berserker subclass, Lunatic armor.

His health depleted at a frightening pace, but the Genius's health depleted in kind.

But Krusty's health was still in the green, his frightening Guardian constitution keeping him alive.

Minori frantically thought through her options. She had Prayer of the Soul to revive a fallen party member, and hadn't used Prayer to the Four Corners, her ultimate defensive ability. Neither helped deal damage, however, and neither would remove the status condition.

She paused thinking long enough to cast Notice of Excorcism on BologneseMaster.

The realization hit that Shoryu and BologneseMaster wouldn't kill Krusty before he fell under the status effect's sway, taking into account how the Genius would worsen his condition.

Then, if she was right about him switching sides, he'd simply have to activate defensive abilities long enough for BolongeseMaster to fall sway to the Genius, and then she'd lose.

She didn't have Shiroe to pull a Deus ex Machina. She didn't have her guildmates backing her up.

She was a little girl with delusions of grandeur and a fancy set of robes..

She rose her staff, preparing to delay the inevitable.

No.

She switched her target from BologneseMaster to Krusty.

"Notice of Exorcism!"

"Sᴜʙᴍɪᴛ. I ᴡɪʟʟ ɢʀᴀɴᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴊᴏʏ ᴀɴᴅ ᴇɴʟɪɢʜᴛᴍᴇɴᴛ."

It was a difference of one second.

Her spell delayed Krusty's status condition long enough for him to die at the hands of Shoryu.

But to her surprise, he didn't fall.

"Attack it! Second Rage only gives me ten seconds!"

Even Minori joined into the assault.

But contrary to their expectations, the Genius didn't continue to defend itself..

Instead, it chose to retreat.

Even as Krusty chased it, Minori knew he wouldn't reach it in time.

Krusty fell, his ten seconds expired.

Shoryu and BologneseMaster harassed it, but without Krusty, the monster easily beat them back.

Minori ran, then halted.

She needed to start reviving Krusty immediately, or he'd be forced to respawn in Akihabara's cathedral because she would be forced back to Akihabara before completing her spell... At least the progress of the status effect seemed to slow as the monster grew more distant.

But the monster was heading towards the highway, and she could barely imagine the havoc it could cause if it hitched a ride to a part of Japan she couldn't easily reach.

But what could she do if she caught it, when three above-level-90 adventurers hadn't done enough damage to destroy it?

Wait.

The highway.

Minori readied her staff.

Using her Scribe abilities, she recalled an anatomy book she had read with almost photographic clarity.

A human (or in this case, human-like) torso was approximately twenty to thirty centimeters long.

From experience, she knew that Japanese highways had speed limits of 100 kilometers per hour.

It would take a car one hundredth of a second to cross that distance.

What she planned would have been flatly impossible to do without fatalities for an ordinary human.

Of course, she wasn't.

The Genius paused at the edge of the highway, then stepped onto it and began running, trying to intercept a semi truck.

It jumped onto the front of the truck, underneath the driver's line of sight.

"Prayer to the Four Quarters!"

Black, red, white and blue barriers arranged into a rectangular prism, blinked into, and rapidly out of, existence.

Like before, when she'd used barriers to slow her fall, the barriers impacted the monster's back.

This time, however, the barriers didn't give. The monster was splattered across every lane of traffic, as it inadvertently found itself sandwiched between an immovable object and an unstoppable force.

~oOo~

A/N: thank you to my beta, Mizu25!


	8. Chapter 8

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 8**

~oOo~

Even with the discovery of portal talismans, Shoryu hadn't seriously entertained the thought of crossing back over to the real world. Sure, he'd had a vague idea that he wanted to see his parents again, that he'd want to return to high school, and maybe go to college.

But his best friend Hein was already in Crescent Moon with him, his guildmates were fun to be around, and taking quests as Crescent Moon's battle team leader was enjoyable..

So he'd expected to be one of the last members of Crescent Moon to leave Elder Tale, and wouldn't hesitate to give Crescent Moon's younger members precedence in crossing over.

As such, the fact that he was back in the real world didn't properly sink in until after Minori, with the help of some consumable mana regeneration items, successfully revived Krusty.

She finished giving Krusty a very abridged briefing of what he could expect just in time to be forced back to Akihabara.

Shoryu sat down, put his head in his hands, and tried to work through what he was feeling without suddenly falling apart.

His post-battle jitters from adrenaline leaving his system were making that somewhat difficult.

Okay. Okay.

Minori had already alerted his parents to the fact that he was fine, and his Wolf Fang race wouldn't be a huge surprise because of the joint photograph Crescent Moon and Log Horizon had taken and uploaded to the internet. So he wasn't anxious about his parents.

He hadn't been prepared to be a diplomat- he was a fairly quick thinker, but not a strategist like Shiroe or Minori. But the intention had been for Krusty to take over when the next party came through anyways, and he didn't feel a pathological need to avoid responsibility, unlike his carefree friend Hein. So he wasn't worried about that either.

So then what was causing that queasy feeling in his stomach?

He looked around.

Oh, yeah, the property damage.

At least the truck had been mostly undamaged because of Minori's reflexes.

BologneseMaster seemed to be having similar thoughts, a pained grimace on his face.

Was this why superheroes wore masks, so they didn't have to pay when they broke something?

Shoryu was sorely tempted to mutter something dramatic about "vanquishing evil," and vanish into the night, as uncharacteristic (and ridiculously stupid) as that would be.

But there had to be some leeway when he was trying to save lives, right?

Police sirens wailed in the distance.

He shook his head, and slapped his hands on his cheeks. He needed to at least act confident; it wouldn't do for his first impressions to be "violent thug" and "moody teenager" respectively.

"I wonder if my family will recognize me," mused BologneseMaster.

And wow, didn't that make his fears seem trivial?

He tried to think of some way to comfort the felinoid, but Krusty got there first.

Even kneeling down, Krusty dwarfed the diminutive Assassin. Without his Wolf Fang skills activated, Krusty's words were inaudible to Shoryu, but when he finished his speech, BologneseMaster chuckled and seemed to regain some of his regular cheer.

Shoryu had known on an intellectual level that Krusty was charismatic- he had to be, to keep the loyalty of his thousands of guildmates in D.D.D.- but seeing an example of that charisma in real life was an entirely different experience.

All three stored their weapons away into their magic bags.

After a few more moments of waiting, emergency vehicles began swarming the scene, a cavalcade of police cars, fire trucks, ambulances, and even the occasional JSDF vehicle.

Krusty spoke for the group, and Shoryu and BologneseMaster stayed back and let him handle the first responders.

Eventually, the news crews descended like a swarm of locusts, and Shoryu found himself fielding interviewers. He of course tried his level best to direct their attention to Krusty, although he still had to answer some banal questions about himself.

Enough news choppers flew over the area that he didn't notice one of the helicopters was landing until a man and women jumped out of it, rushed towards Krusty, and embraced him.

The reporters surrounding him rapidly switched focus to Krusty, and between the mentions of the Diet and referring to Krusty's mother as "Representative," Shoryu gathered that she was a legislator.

That explained where Krusty got his political acumen. He remembered something about him going to Yale, too…

Shoryu and BologneseMaster took the chance to sidle out of the way.

"Well, what now?"

BologneseMaster shrugged. "Your family near here?"

"Not really, but I know the bus schedule. What about you?"

'It'll take a bit of running, but I can get home in a few hours. If they haven't moved, anyways…"

"Won't your, err, you know-"

"Don't worry about it. I'm an assassin; avoiding attention is what I do."

Shoryu nodded. "Alright, I'll see you later, I guess…"

"Only if I let you." BologneseMaster winked, then disappeared.

Shoryu skirted around the reporters, then jogged to an isolated bus stop. He switched out his armor for the less conspicuous clothes in his bag, hid his Wolf Fang features, and removed his bandana. He probably still looked a little weird, but that was unavoidable.

He waited patiently for the late-night bus in the bus stop, but vaulted himself on top of it as soon as he heard the rumble of an approaching bus.

Vaulting up to the top of the bus stop, Shoryu prepared himself to do something he had always wanted to.

He crouched, then exploded forward, successfully landing on top of a moving vehicle.

To his relief, the bus driver didn't stop.

He laid down and watched the few stars he could see in the sky through Tokyo's light pollution.

~oOo~

Walking through his old neighborhood was a bizarre experience.

Familiar and homey, punctuated with jarring bouts of mental dissonance.

This was the cost of respawning.

He initially missed the street his home was on, having forgotten its name, and the appearance of the building on the end.

He had been sure a childhood friend had lived there, before they moved away.

But he could have resigned as Crescent Moon's battle team leader, and he didn't.

He saw a car pull out of his house's driveway.

It took him a little while to make the connection.

"Hey, wait!"

Shoryu ran after the car, and nearly collided with it as it screeched to a stop.

His Elder Tale character had been based on himself, but had been created when he was thirteen, and was therefore shorter than he had been before the Catastrophe.

But his parents still recognized him, which was good, because if he had just looked at their faces, he wouldn't have recognized them.

~oOo~

The Round Table Alliance didn't interrogate Eins in a dimly lit room. They didn't form a kangaroo court, or threaten him with being sent back to the Cathedral.

What would be the point? What justice could they extract?

After all, it was perfectly within his rights to withdraw Honesty from the alliance at any time, and as a large guild, they had provided much of the mana and funding required to build the portal talisman.

But he still felt the full weight of their accusatory gazes.

He had worked with them for almost two years, and genuinely respected them and their opinions.

So it was hard to see the betrayal on Marielle's face, and the disgust on Isaac's.

But Eins viewed himself as a principled man, even if no one else felt the same.

So he explained to their stony faces that Plant Hwyaden had promised only one thing to him- that they wouldn't monopolize the technology like the Round Table Alliance would.

He was gratified to see their faces shift as they realized he didn't do it for personal gain.

With the exception of perhaps Marielle, his colleagues led guilds where many of their players were at least resigned to being stuck in Elder Tale, if not outright enthused.

He could even sympathize- being the kind of player who had enough time to lead a massive guild like Honesty, he wasn't the kind of player who'd had a whole lot of ties back home.

But Eins led the less elite, less driven players. The players who'd had relatively ordinary lives before the Catastrophe, who played Elder Tale not as an escape, but simply a hobby. Interacting with them, he saw every day how badly they missed their family and friends.

He'd understood, and even agreed with the decision that his guild would be one of the last to have a representative sent back home. After all, his guild had few exceptional players, and they were sorely needed to keep order.

And yet, aside from how slowly it was taking to move the Japanese Adventurers back, he knew Adventurers from other regions would have an even more difficult time making it back to their respective nations.

It was a bit soft-hearted of him, but this political squabble with Plant Hwyaden wasn't worth denying the entire world their way back home until the rest of the Alliance felt good and ready.

Of course, Eins knew he'd be "asked" to step down from his position as guildmaster.

His betrayal would be swept under a rug, and no one would know of how he martyred himself.

… Maybe he should write a book.

~oOo~

"Item six on our agenda." Kazuhiko cleared his throat, and rustled his sheaf of papers. He had positioned himself between Nureha and Indicus. The latter, despite the already hour-long meeting, still maintained an acerbic glare towards the former.

The ten seats of Plant Hwyaden lounged in an opulently adorned compartment, dimly lit by an assortment of candelabras. Trees blurred past the circular portholes, distorted by the space-warping magic of the levitating train.

"We need to discuss last night. Indicus, if you please."

Indicus opened her mouth, but was interrupted by KR, as the green-haired elf made an offhand comment about "saving the best for last."

She sneered at him, but didn't deign to comment. "Eins has been our agent for months, but so far had been of limited utility. It came of something as a surprise that he'd be willing to give us one of the portal talismans, but it wasn't outside the realm of belief." She grimaced. "We had originally planned to send Nureha through anyways, and decided that would be our best option regardless. But Nureha decided it would be okay to waste our time being indecisive with the follow through, so the Genius got through and our plans got fucked."

Finished summarizing, she returned to glaring at Nureha.

Uncharacteristically, Quon spoke up. "Actually, I don't think Nureha had anything to do with it – I think something about how much energy it takes to make a portal spawns geniuses. That's why the Geniuses showed up after the Catastrophe, and why one just happened to be present when we opened the portal."

Jered smacked him. "Shaddup boy, don't interrupt your betters." The elderly elf shut down Quon. Had this not been so in-character for him, Kazuhiko would have suspected this to be an intentional deflection. Jered continued. "The important part is that we've still got a summon on the other side of the portal feeding us data. What've they told us?"

"Very little," said KR. "Aside from the short timeframe, I haven't gotten its paws on any computing equipment it could use."

"Then try harder, you incompetent jackass."

KR rolled his eyes, ignoring Indicus's snide remarks.

"Has any progress been made on reverse engineering the portal talisman?" Roreil had an almost innocent expression, his round features and round armor giving him a childlike appearance incongruent with the atmosphere of the meeting.

"Not yet, blondie. We've had even less time to work with it than KR." Zeldys's words were clipped, but not polite.

The train rattled.

Kazuhiko gave a perfunctory glance to the outside of the train and noted that they were now over the mountains that separated Westelande from Eastal.

Returning his attention to the group, he sighed. It seemed like placing the discussion about their next move at the end of the session had backfired. All this stress wasn't doing him any favors. If it hadn't been for his status as an adventurer, he knew the grey hairs in his otherwise long, black mane would have quickly multiplied.

As such, he needed to return their attention to the topic on hand.

"All that aside, what will our next move be?"

To his surprise, it was Nureha that spoke. Kazuhiko had known her home life had been exceptionally unpleasant, and she had developed extensive self-esteem issues due to that. He'd seen improvement over much of her first year in Elder Tale, but she'd been backsliding for the past few months, likely due to Indicus's abuse.

"We still have the portal talisman. Our plans will continue."

For all that she was a figurehead, her charisma was powerful when she chose to use it.

Indicus of course began immediately squabbling with her, but the other seats seemed amenable to simply maintaining the status quo.

Indeed, he had been ready to propose the idea himself. He'd joined Plant Hwyaden out of a sense of duty, but that didn't make the countless administrative tasks easier. Reducing their numbers, and by extension, Indicus's power base, would be extremely beneficial.

~oOo~

IMPORTANT NOTICE: As of today (6/12/16) on reddit's /r/anime subreddit, a contest for deciding the best girl is ongoing. Currently, Akatsuki, Marielle, and Lenessia are in the running. For the love of DATABASE make a reddit account and start participating! Let's COUNTERACTION RISING all over those inferior anime girls!

A/N: Thanks to Mizu25, my beta!

Last edited 6/13/26: The last Shoryu section has been moved back to chapter 9, due to advice on reddit. It's been slightly modified, but not by much.


	9. Chapter 9

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 9**

~oOo~

He'd been planning to experiment more with his newfound abilities on Sunday, but his all-nighter on top of exhaustion from using his mana had made him too lethargic to do anything for most of the day.

The upside was that Michael woke extremely early on Monday morning, the sun not quite over the horizon.

He ate his cereal with robotic precision (and milk, because he wasn't a barbarian).

What should he do?

His mind went in circles as he tried to figure out how to grind xp. PVP would probably work, but at his level, it would be an extremely foolhardy option. Dogs and cats could potentially count as low-level mobs if he beat them up, but they'd be difficult to catch. Carnivorous plants would make ideal targets, but he didn't have a job, and with his experiences trying to sneak pokemon cards out of walmart as a kid, he knew he made a terrible thief.

Also, he'd probably be New York's first supervillain if he did any of those things, but if he'd learned anything, it was that infamy got book deals.

He polished off his cereal, poured the remaining milk into a cup, then drank it.

Moving to wash his tableware, Michael stared out the window.

Brick apartment buildings were clustered tightly, diffusing early morning sunlight over their roofs. The majority of the road was in shadow, while the rest was painted a desaturated orange.

That reminded him of something, actually.

Returning to his room, Michael opened the door of the closet he had built into his wall. Hunting through the boxes, he found an orange bandana his brother had used in a middle school play years ago.

His lips quirked. In trying to help his brother set up his costume, Michael had taken it upon himself to cut out eyeholes in the black bandanna their parents had bought. It had turned out that safety scissors weren't the best choice for the job. Luckily, he'd succeeded the second time around, and the school drama instructor had bought their excuse that more foxes were orange than black. It had been a memorable rendition of "the Mask of Zorro."

He shook his head, dispersing the intrusive thoughts, and fastened the bandanna around his forehead.

Michael pulled his green sweatshirt off a wall hanger, grabbed his brass knuckles, and left the apartment. Making sure the hood concealed the bandanna (he didn't, after all, want to be mistaken for a gang member), he made his way onto the street.

Having already decided his path in his mind, he put in earbuds and started playing music through his phone.

He met few people as he passed through the neighborhood, but made sure to wave cheerily and say "Yo!" to counteract the image he probably presented of a delinquent hoodlum.

It took him half an hour to complete the four mile circuit around his neighborhood. Pulling up his status screen, he checked to see if he'd earned the "Border Patrol" subclass.

The answer, sadly, was no.

That was a disappointment- subclasses were grindable without combat, so he wouldn't need to fight anything to get the benefits.

Then again, he'd only done one patrol. Maybe he needed to do more?

Thus resolved, Michael decided to do two more circuits. Picking up the pace a little, he was pleasantly surprised to find his feet barely hurt and he felt a negligible amount of tiredness compared to the usual exhaustion he'd feel after a long run.

The second circuit again failed to give him a subclass, and by the third circuit he was jogging at a moderate pace.

Still, he greeted everyone he saw, and the people he'd seen before cheerfully greeted him back.

He was marveling over the fact that he was barely winded as he saw three musclebound men surrounding a taller, but thinner one.

The latter was holding his hands up, backed up against a closed barbershop.

That didn't look good.

But at the same time, it wasn't any of his business. Plus, it looked more like a robbery, and less like an in-progress murder, so he didn't feel particularly guilty about planning to go around them.

The taller man disrupted his plans by looking at him and shouting "Help!"

He'd've been perfectly fine ignoring the plea, but the gangsters took one look at him and pulled out their weapons.

"What the fuck are you doing on our turf, you bandana-wearing motherfucker?"

But his bandana- ah, shit. Michael realized with a start that the jogging would have dislodged his bandana enough to be visible. He came to a stop, and tried to process his thoughts.

"I'm talking to you, asshat. If I don't get some respect, I'm gonna start shooting!" The gangster brandished his pistol, holding it sideways.

Shit, shit, shit.

Michael's incoherent attempts at planning were brought to a halt as he felt a bullet graze his thigh, the gangster's aim negatively affected by his abysmal stance.

The pain was dulled, but time seemed to freeze anyways.

Well, he really only had one option now.

With one hand, Michael pulled the bandana over his eyes and took his earbuds out. In a single fluid motion, he grabbed his brass knuckles out of the pockets of his hoodie and slipped them onto his hands, while settling into a crouch.

Then, relying on pure instinct, he took a single step.

Now directly in front of the gangster who had addressed him, he punched. The gangster was blindsided, still focused on his afterimage.

Yellow light came out of his fist, and pavement cracked as he slammed his hand into the ground. All four of the men- helpless victim included- were thrown into the air. Taking another step, he flung himself after the man the gangsters had been mugging.

Neatly catching him, Michael set the man down.

The gangsters tried to get up, but one had broken a leg, and all three had lost their weapons.

Michael took a moment to consider his options.

Ah, what the hell. He'd always wanted to call out a special attack.

"Aura Saber!"

Michael jumped into the air and kicked, a shockwave of compressed air and mana bowling over the gangsters.

This time, they stayed down.

He checked their pulse, as the almost-mugged man called the police.

He felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned around.

"Dude, I can't thank you enough. You're the superhero New York needs, man, and maybe the one it wants, but not because it deserves one."

Michael rolled his eyes at the badly mangled quote.

"Oh, can I have your autograph!"

"Uh, sure."

He heard police sirens approaching, as the man fumbled around in his pocket for a pen.

Reflexively, he began signing his name.

Aw, crap. He had intended to keep his identity secret for at least a little while while he figured stuff out.

Thinking fast, he added an "angelo" to the end.

The man grabbed his card. "That's not really a superhero name… Wait. Do you mean like the ninja turtle?""

"Um."

The man looked over his costume.

"Holy shit, that's genius!"

Michael blinked. That worked too, he guessed.

"Yeah. Right. Totally. Anyways, I need to go, secret identity and all that."

"I get it man, good luck!"

Michael Phantom Stepped away (in the opposite direction of his neighborhood, of course), circled around, and made his way back to the apartment complex.

Disappointingly, he still didn't have the "Border Patrol" subclass. At least he seemed to have gained some sort of ongoing quest for his efforts, though...

~oOo~

In Krusty's memories, talk show hosts were immaculate, larger than life figures.

He found it rather ironic that he'd forgotten his favorite pets, but retained his fascination with TV personalities and their larger-than-life egos.

So he had been somewhat excited to appear on (extremely) late night TV, even despite his exhaustion, and despite how hastily arranged this interview was.

But to his concealed disappointment, the long-legged, conventionally attractive host fell flat. Her makeup was masterfully done, but he couldn't help notice how her nose made a slight diagonal across her face, or how each cheek didn't dimple quite the same way when she smiled, or the hairline scar on her hand.

It didn't help that, in this case, _he_ was the larger than life figure.

Even with his blue dress uniform on rather than his armor, he knew he cut an imposing figure.

Krusty could easily visualize what the crowd saw- the host, perched on a stool and chirping her questions, while he stretched languidly on the couch, fleeting smiles only briefly punctuating his evaluating expression.

With light brown, almost blonde hair and six feet of height, he'd look like a westerner at first glance, although his facial features would reverse that impression.

He'd seen himself in the mirror- perfectly smooth, even, skin and symmetric features combined to make him more attractive than most people would look with makeup on. That wasn't to say his features were generic or plastic, however, as something about the Catastrophe had transposed many of his original features onto his new face.

The host leaned forward. He idly tried to remember her name as she began to speak.

"So, I'm going to ask the question we've all been wondering- you're well respected, well connected, and lead thousands of people. Your family is politically well connected, and it wouldn't have been hard to get taken seriously. So why didn't you come over first?"

Krusty had been well trained to take on tough questions.

Step one: buy time.

He leaned forward and smiled. "Well, that's a good question. Why didn't I come first?"

Step two: prevaricate.

"Yes, I _could_ have come through first, but there were a few reasons I didn't."

Step three: present a carefully-worded version of the truth.

"The biggest one was that I'd been teleported to China, and only recently made my way back to Akihabara, so I wasn't properly caught up."

Of course, he'd been there for months, but recent was a relative term. And not being caught up was more or less true- nobody except possibly Shiroe could have kept track of everything the adventurers got up to.

"And of course, I had a lady friend I hadn't visited in quite a long while."

He let his smile get a little wider as the host tittered behind an elegant red and yellow fan. His relationship with Princess Lenessia wasn't really romantic, but denial wouldn't stop the tabloids anyways.

He paused for a moment, searching for a third reason. He knew a list came off much stronger than a mere two examples.

"Finally, I needed to stay in Akihabara in order to counter any subterfuge by Plant Hwyaden."

That had been a bit more than he wanted to admit, but hopefully would satiate her curiosity.

Of course, the real reason had been that politics bored him, but that wouldn't go over well.

And now he was free to implement step four: change topics to divert attention.

"By the way, what movies and music have I missed while I was gone?"

He gave a quick laugh, as the host reciprocated.

This would be familiar territory for her, as he knew she was likely used to interviewing starlets and musicians.

"Oh, you've missed so much! There was an excellent world war one drama everyone's been raving about for months. I don't want to spoil too much, but I was crying by the end scene!"

She continued for a few more sentences, naming a few movies and songs, although she kept her descriptions brief so as not to bore her audience.

Rounding out her recap, she said "oh, and there was yet another absolutely terrible ninja turtle movie. I wouldn't normally mention it, but we've had some interesting news from America..."

"I've been informed of that, actually." Krusty had been wondering when the host would get around to mentioning it.

"Well it's certainly good to see that those who've already figured out how to become adventurers have decided to help the populace, but I've seen a lot of people concerned that magic could prove to be a destabilizing force. What do you think the effects will be?"

Krusty had been prepared for this question, or one similar, and had a response ready to go.

"Heroes have to fight villain after villain, scheme after scheme, to keep the innocent safe. They're always outnumbered, always outgunned, and always make it through only with sheer determination. Or at least, that's what many stories would have to believe. But of course, stories are merely that- stories. For a compelling narrative, everything has to hinge on the actions of the characters the audience is already familiar with. But in real life, there is no such thing as a side character. Each and every person has their own dreams, desires, friends and family. And in real life, the innocent are wholly capable of defending themselves. Michaelangelo's actions are certainly commendable, but I believe that, soon, everyone will be capable of their own magic, and the world will be led into a new golden age."

The host's mouth was slightly ajar, and the audience didn't seem to know how to react. There was isolated clapping, but many looked confused, or even disbelieving. His speech hadn't gone down as well as he'd hoped.

At least recovery would be simple.

"Incidentally, this Michelangelo reminds me of my traveling companion and good friend Leonardo. I don't know if they're related, but I'm hoping they're not- if dressing like a turtle is genetic, we're going to have a much bigger problem on our hands than magic."

The host and audience laughed. His joke hadn't been the most elegant, perhaps, but it did the trick.

Now he just had to distract the host for an additional fifteen minutes, preferably by throwing Leonardo and his peculiarities under the bus as much as possible.

~oOo~

BologneseMaster fidgeted outside the door of his house.

The key was in his paws, but he couldn't bring himself to use it.

It had taken him the better part of the night to get here; he'd avoided public transport in a bid to get some time to himself.

That hadn't been one of his better decisions.

Four hours to stew in his doubts had erased the confidence Krusty's short speech had given him.

Releasing a shuddering breath, he hid the key back into the flowerpot by the door.

Simply waltzing in seemed… wrong, somehow.

Instead, he knocked on the door.

"I'm home!"

Immediately, the recriminations started. Who would answer at this time of the night? Or morning, as it was.

He heard the scratching of nails against hardwood, and the barking of a dog.

BologneseMaster smiled. Well, that answered that question.

He heard the flick of a lightswitch and the thumping of feet as tsuki whined outside the door.

The door opened, and his dog nearly bowled him over.

His heart almost burst as he saw the face of his son for the first time in two years.

"Down here, kid."

His son's eyes opened comically wide.

"Dad?" His stunned expression morphed into a disbelieving smile.

"Give your old man a hug, I've missed you."

The fur on back grew damp as he hugged his son. Curiously, so did the fur on his face.

~oOo~

It would have been incorrect to call the events of last night an unmitigated failure. A failure? Absolutely. But that was mitigated by a single, crucial detail.

Plant Hwyaden still had their portal maker.

It took the average spellcaster quite a while to recuperate from totally using their mana, but that problem was easily solved by simply throwing more spellcasters into the equation.

So at five in the morning, the world still dark, Nureha dropped gracefully onto the asphalt of one of Tokyo's many roads.

Activating her overskill, she layered illusion over illusion to conceal her appearance. Her height was the same, but instead of her voluptuous figure and long, slightly curled black hair she appeared to be merely an average high school, or perhaps college student wearing slacks and a button up shirt.

It was good and bad that the area was completely unfamiliar to her. Bad for the obvious reasons, but good because she was nowhere near her parents.

It would be incorrect to say that she hated them. She merely tried to pretend they didn't exist, and actively avoided thinking about them. Indeed, she would have been happy to hear that they had died over the intervening two years.

But it would be incorrect to say that she hated them.

She walked at a leisurely pace as the city woke up. Traffic appeared in even out-of the way roads. The morning sun competed with the street lights, and slowly made them irrelevant.

Eventually, she found her way to a small shopping mall. To her luck, it was open fairly early, even though most of the shops were closed down.

Finding a cell phone vendor, she stepped inside.

A sleepy cashier idled at the counter, but no other staff were present.

Stepping outside of his view, Nureha turned on a display unit.

Plant Hwyaden's homepage was nearly the same as before the catastrophe- the same raid schedules, the same blog posts, and the same tired image macros. But the forums were still ticking, and the moderators left behind had kept the remaining community vibrant even without Elder Tale. In fact, looking at the number of registered users, a massive spike had happened in the last few days- the Round Table's concerted effort to make them look bad had had a counterproductive effect.

So, confident that she could reach thousands of loyal members of Plant Hwyaden, she used her administrator credentials to made a very simple news post.

"We're back."

~oOo~

It was a bright, cheerful Sunday.

Well, it _would_ have been a cheerful Sunday, if Shoryu hadn't accidentally mentioned to his mother that he wanted to see his friends in Crescent Moon who hadn't been playing during the Catastrophe.

One thing lead to another, and well...

"What do you mean I have to go back to school!?"

"You have a bright future ahead of you, and you're not going to squander it because you didn't finish your high school education."

"Minori isn't going to school!"

"Minori can only stay on earth for four hours a day, as you very well know, and that time would be better spent on diplomacy. And anyways, we're not Minori's parents."

Shoryu paused to think.

"But the other students won't be comfortable with me because I'm an adventurer!"

"So what? We don't need the students' permission, just the administration's. And if they deny you entrance, we can hit them with an unlawful discrimination lawsuit."

Shoryu groaned. He would have refused to come over if he had realized he'd be forced to go back to high school.

But… why didn't he want to go to school?

It's not like he'd have Elder Tale to distract him, and he'd missed the friends he left behind. It's wasn't like he was philosophically opposed to sitting down and getting in some book learning.

But with all his time in Elder Tale, it just didn't feel right to sit back and let Krusty, Minori, and BologneseMaster do the hard work.

There was a certain appeal in falling back into normalcy, he knew. It was the path of least resistance. Hadn't he watched so many anime where the main characters, despite their kickass powers and wold-changing destinies, still deigned to attend high school?

He knew his mom was, in her own pushy way, looking out for him. It had to be terrifying to see your child flung around like a ragdoll by an eldritch monster in high definition on your flatscreen while you could do nothing to interfere. She just wanted him to bow out, and leave the fighting to people like Krusty who armored themselves in half inch thick plate.

But as shonen as it was, Shoryu couldn't abandon his friends.

His mother had turned to pay attention to his sister, evidently considering the argument over with. Possibly with good reason. He hadn't put up much resistance, had he?

Shoryu breathed in, out, and back in, centering himself. "Mom, I _can't_ go back to school."

"I thought we settled this? We'd just-"

"Mom," Shoryu interjected, "please, just let me explain. I'm not against the idea of going to school in principle, but right now, I just… can't. We thought re-establishing contact would be entirely peaceful, maybe with a few scuffles. But Minori got stabbed by some crazy within days, and even Geniuses are deciding to attack. I can't just sit back and let that happen. I can't just reintegrate and watch passively."

His mother looked conflicted. "Shoryu, you've been fighting for two and a half years. Can't you let other people pick up the slack? It's not just adventurers any more. There's the police and the JSDF."

"They're not going to be enough. I could tell them everything I know about fighting monsters, but geniuses are on an entirely different level."

She sighed. "I'd say you could get hurt, but there's no 'could,' about it. You're absolutely, positively going to get hurt. You're fighting against monsters with swords! Not even a gun! And I know Minori said Adventurers respawned on death, but how do you know it's really you, and not just a copy? How can you keep fighting when you could die?"

"I have died. I-" Michael grimaced, then continued in a softer voice. "I've died before. It wasn't fun, but it wasn't horrible. I know, because I experience the entire process. But I'll do it again as many times as necessary. Because I'll come back, but you, or dad, or Kaiyo won't."

He met his mother's eyes. An unsure look crossed her face, but then her expression softened, and she hugged him.

"Oh, Shoryu," she breathed. "You've grown up so much, so fast. We can put off school for a few months."

He refrained from pointing out he'd been gone about two and a half years, and instead just sunk into her embrace.

She squeezed a bit harder, then growled "but if you think, _mister_ , that this means you're getting out of learning _each and every subject_ as thoroughly as possible, you are. _Very. Much. Mistaken._ "

Shoryu laughed uncomfortably.

~oOo~

A/N: And thus concludes Arc 1.


	10. Chapter 10 - Interludes 1

~oOo~

Log Horizon © Mamare Touno

This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978

Chapter 10 - Deleted Scenes

~oOo~

~Interlude: Yakuza~

When the Disappearance had happened, Shōsuke had been beyond pissed. He had been absolutely convinced that everyone that had Disappeared had been sucked into the game world, and were having kickass adventures while he was stuck in his shitty convenience store job that paid just enough for his apartment, necessities, and internet connection.

Everyone had told him he was callous for not sympathising with the plight of everyone who'd lost someone, but how could he, when he was so envious?

It burned him up inside that he'd been conked out, too exhausted from his job to play Elder Tale on the release of the new expansion.

But hey, it's not like there weren't upsides.

With such a large proportion of Japan's teenagers and young adults suddenly gone, Japan had an even greater labour shortage than before. With his additional bargaining power, he scored a job as an accountant for a stable, managing the finances of those who managed sumo wrestlers.

But he quickly found it wasn't much better than his previous job. The extra pay was nice, but the hours were longer and his duties somehow more soul crushing.

So when, in the process of a routine "business negotiation" with the local yakuza, he was tacitly offered a job, he had no problem accepting.

To be honest, the work wasn't that much more interesting. But the hours and pay were better, and the fact that his work was so illicit helped make up for the fact that he couldn't play Elder Tale, since most of the developers had disappeared as well.

But since that little girl's press conference, with the prime minister showing off his new trick, time was ticking.

The Disappeared would be returning, and he'd read enough shonen manga to know what happened to criminal organizations when what were effectively superheroes showed up.

Still, they wasn't exactly helpless, he knew.

The dull thump of throwing knives against wooden posts was interspersed by punctuated gunfire.

If there was anything he knew, it was Elder Tale's assassin class. The builds, the skills, the strengths, and the weaknesses.

It didn't particularly phase him that he was training killers.

The Disappeared had had their day, squandering their luck building "relationships" with the NPCs, instead of conquering them. Even Plant Hwyaden didn't properly leverage their power, for all the Akihabaran adventurers talked of their ruthlessness.

As for himself, he trained his kenjutsu forms, marveling at how, even with only a few days of work, his flabby, nerdy build was already transitioning into lean muscle.

He activated the Sweeper skill to rapidly decapitate training dummies in sequence.

The decline of the Yakuza would end with the ascendancy of Shōsuke.

~Interlude: Working on the Ocypete~

"Port paddlewheel number twelve needs repairs."

Izumi groaned. "It's always number twelve. Alright." He hoisted himself up. "How much Mage Equivalent is it gonna take?"

"'Bout two point six."

"Two point six? Really? You're using level fifty as your baseline, and not level thirty-five, right?"

"Unfortunately. It got gnawed on by some water mob the last time the Ocypete made the trip to that one port near Susukino."

"Damn." Izumi jogged to the steamboat's paddlewheel. After its latest series of voyages, it had to be drydocked for repairs.

There was one upside, to this latest round of repairs, though. With the introduction of the mana storage systems, they didn't need to keep around a lot of mages to have the requisite energy to enchant, empower, and repair Ocypete's various parts, all of which tended to break rather more often than Akihabara's merchant guilds would like the rest of the world to believe.

"I heard you had a problem with paddle twelve?"

"Yeah, it's deformed. We're going to need you to bend it back into shape."

"Got it." Using his Smith subclass and the prodigious strength of the Guardian class, he used his bare hands to manhandle the bent iron back into place.

Now for the difficult part.

The upside to not having any mages around (besides the ones with relevant subclasses, anyways) was that he didn't get distracted by their chatter.

The downside was that, when he needed something be-spelled, he had so do it himself.

Taking off the alligator clip he kept around on his belt, he attached it to the paddle. "Run me a cable from the nearest repository, will you?"

The other engineer didn't look happy at being ordered around, but that sucked for him because Izumi had seniority. And anyways, he needed to center himself for this.

Calling on the higher-level skills of the Smith subclass always felt vaguely mystical to him. He drew on something deep inside himself to bring out the power to not just shape iron, but imbue it with intent, with enchantments and wards. From experience, he knew all but the cheapest production-class items were labors of love from their creators.

So he was, understandably, not happy with this entitled lander noble trying to get his attention.

Doing his best to tune out her nasal, high-pitched voice, he ran his hands over the paddle, getting a feel for it.

The other engineer attached the cable to the back of the alligator clip. He placed both hands on the metal, channeling his intent for it to be durable and resistant against monster attacks.

"Hey, hey!" He jerked, and the paddle split along the middle as he overloaded the metal with magic.

Unphased, the Lander noble glared at him. "You dare ignore me, the wife of the marquis of-"

Isumi tuned her out again, pissed off. She harried him as he called for a replacement paddle, promising all manner of retribution.

Finally, he broke. "What in the world do you want from me!? I'm just a Smith; I'm not in a management position."

Not backing down, she said "my daughter's doll is coming apart. I've been told that you're the most senior of the engineers currently here, so you're most likely to know a competent Fuller."

He felt a little dickish, but that mingled with lingering annoyance that the noblewoman had seen fit to bother him, rather than just asking literally anyone else.

"I'll put you in contact with Amos."

"Thank you." The woman turned Fuller away, and Izumi returned to his work.

~Interlude: Just your Average High School Slice-of-Life Anime~

A noncanon omake, wherein Shoryu doesn't have his epiphany and is forced to go back to school.

~oOo~.

Shoryu was a seasoned swashbuckler. He could cut leaves out of mid air with his blades, catch flies with chopsticks, and even do that trick he saw in anime where the super-fast character would kick their opponent into the air, appear above them, then smack them down into the ground.

Unfortunately, his speed was paltry compared to how quickly his mother managed to contact the school administration and get him reinstated as a student.

So after a Sunday wasted by trying to catch up on schoolwork, he was woken up by his enthusiastic little sister jumping on his stomach.

"Good morning, brother! Morning, morning, Morning!"

Shoryu made an incoherent noise of protest.

Shoryu's sister hugged him, and he smiled.

"Waa!"

Shoryu hefted her over his shoulder like a sack of sweet potatoes as he got off of his futon.

"Grr, you've angered the big, bad wolf!"

"Ahh, put me down!"

"Say pleeeease."

Shoryu could almost feel her pouting.

"FFFine. You big meanie. Pleeeease put me down."

She stopped wiggling as he placed her feet on the ground. He ruffled her hair and smiled.

"Thanks for waking me up, but you're going to have to bother me later- I need to get ready for school."

"School is dumb," she said sagely.

"Oh, ho ho, indeed." Shoryu did his best old man impression, hunched over with a cane in one hand, the other behind his back.

She left his room, and Shoryu started digging through his closet for something to wear. Of course, none of the uniforms were in his size.

He grinned smugly, then yelled "Moo~om. All the uniforms are too big. I can't go to school wearing them."

"You absolutely can, young man, and if you don't use some Adventurer hocus-pocus, you absolutely will!"

Crap. And he wasn't a tailor, so he couldn't resize items.

He dug through his bag to see if it had anything useful.

To his relief, it did: correctly sized pants that looked visually similar to the black pants of his school uniform. He'd still have to deal with his shirt and vest being a little big, but that was less of an issue.

He swapped out the battlegear he had slept in for the brown vest and striped tie of his school, taking a moment to mess with the collar of his shirt in front of the mirror. Then, he slid away the divider between his room and the rest of the apartment.

His mother was setting bowls of rice over the kotatsu, as his father read the newspaper. His sister had been waiting anxiously outside of his room, and began bombarding him with questions as soon as he left.

He told her her friend Ashlynn had joined Crescent Moon and was doing fine, that he had, indeed, fought monsters (this was accompanied by sound effects), that he couldn't get action figures made of himself because he had already sold the rights to Oceanic Systems, and that if she wanted to learn how to do Kannabi techniques, she'd need to get permission from mom.

This distracted her sufficiently for Shoryu to sit and be greeted his father.

"Good morning. Shosuke." Impaired by a head injury suffered in his youth, his father's speech was halting, but well-enunciated. His intelligence hadn't been affected, but his fine motor control had suffered.

"Good morning, dad."Shoryu reciprocated his father's earnest smile.

His piece said, his father returned to the newspaper, while Shoryu dug into his breakfast.

He quickly polished off his rice, in time to regain his sister's attention.

In response to her asking about the biggest battle he was in, he related his role in defending a small town from Sahuagin, to the undisguised interest of the rest of his family.

Shoryu wasn't much of a storyteller, but, at least with this tale, he had told it enough times to settle into a cadence, like an old veteran with a well worn war story.

He stopped midway into his narration. Pushing himself up, he said, "well, I would keep talking, but I have to go to school." He shot a peeved glare at his mother.

"Don't sass me, boy." She wagged her finger at him, an amused smile on his face. "And what else would you do? Elder Tale's been shut down since the Disappearance, and it's not like you have any other hobbies."

To his chagrin, she had a point.

And he did want to reconnect with the Crescent Moon members who hadn't been on during the Catastrophe...

He rolled his eyes, grabbed his bag, and left, his sister's goodbye ringing in his ears.

~oOo~

Being Crescent Moon's battle team leader had been something of a hazardous position. He had to participate in high-risk tasks requiring equally high levels, while also using the Teacher System to lower his level in order to train Crescent Moon's newer members. Combined with his status as a front-line combatant, he was sent to the Cathedral disproportionately often. Even members of dedicated combat guilds respawned less often, as they more regularly had access to cleric support.

In spite of that, he still remembered the route to his high school perfectly, perhaps because it had been more recently engraved in his mind.

Luckily, the people he passed on the sidewalk and rode with on the bus didn't recognize him and he wasn't delayed from arriving at school.

Unluckily, the same didn't hold true for his fellow students. He felt their eyes on him as soon as he entered the courtyard, even though his ears and tail were hidden.

Suppressing his anxiety, he looked for a familiar face.

"Yo!"

Shoryu neatly intercepted the arm coming down to pat his shoulder, only to flush and drop it. "Sorry!"

The taller boy, who Shoryu was having trouble recognizing, laughed. "No problem! Damn, Shosuke, you have some ninja-tier-reflexes, don't you?"

The dots in Shoryu's mind connected "Hideo? Wow, I almost didn't recognize you!"

Hideo laughed. "I'd say the same, but your goody-goody expression is just too iconic. Hien still giving you shit?"

"Of course."

To be truthful, Hideo had been more Hien's friend than his, and Shoryu had been as often annoyed as amused by his antics. But it felt good to see a familiar face, and Shoryu's anxiety began slipping away. Maybe this would work out after all.

~oOo~

A/N:

These are a few scenes that expand the scope of the story, but don't really progress the plot. 1 and 2 are canon, but they aren't necessarily going to be mentioned ever again. Scene 3 is not canon, but part of it will be re-used in ch11.

For a variety of reasons, I don't write many scenes that just take a step back and show off what's going on in the wider world, without planning on tying back into the main plot somehow.

So as a review incentive, if a chapter receives 5 (or more) reviews across AO3, FF, and Reddit before I post the next chapter, I'll add a two to four hundred word sidestory or omake to the end of the following chapter. They don't need to fit into the narrative as well, so if you have something you think would be cool to touch on, feel free to suggest it.


	11. Chapter 11

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 11**

~oOo~

"Good morning, brother! Morning, morning, _Morning_!"

Shoryu made an incoherent noise of protest. There was a faint feeling of deja vu, but he dismissed it.

Shoryu's sister hugged him, and he smiled.

"Waa!"

Shoryu hefted her over his shoulder like a sack of sweet potatoes as he got off of his futon.

"Grr, you've angered the big, bad wolf!"

"Ahh, put me down!"

"Say _pleeeease._ "

Shoryu could almost feel her pouting.

" _FFFine._ You big meanie. _Pleeeease_ put me down."

She stopped wiggling as he placed her feet on the ground. He ruffled her hair and smiled.

"Thanks for waking me up, but I could have stood a few more hours of sleep. _I,_ at least, don't have to go to school."

"School is dumb," she said sagely.

"Oh, ho ho, indeed." Shoryu did his best old man impression, hunched over with a cane in one hand, the other behind his back.

She left his room, and Shoryu started digging through his closet for something to wear. That posed a problem. None of the uniforms were in his size, and he hadn't had much in the way of casual clothing to start with.

Frowning, he checked his bag. With so little time to pack, he had few outfits outside from his battle gear. On the plus side, the potions and magical items were bound to be pretty valuable whenever he got around to selling them.

He found some correctly sized black pants that looked visually similar to the black pants of his school uniform and put them on. All of his shirts were a little flamboyant, so he took a white shirt from an old school uniform out of his closet.

He shook it out, grimacing a little at all the dust.

He'd still have to deal with it being a little too big, but hopefully, dressed like this, he wouldn't get accosted by reporters. It had to take at least a little time to track him down, right? Especially if he looked like every other schoolkid.

Shoryu swapped out the battlegear he had slept in, taking a moment to mess with the collar of his shirt in front of the mirror. Then, he slid away the divider between his room and the rest of the apartment.

His mother was setting bowls of rice over the kotatsu, as his father read the newspaper. His sister had been waiting anxiously outside of his room, and began bombarding him with questions as soon as he left.

He told her her friend Ashlynn had joined Crescent Moon and was doing fine, that he had, indeed, fought monsters (this was accompanied by sound effects), that he couldn't get action figures made of himself because he had already sold the rights to Oceanic Systems, and that if she wanted to learn how to do Kannabi techniques, she'd need to get permission from mom.

This distracted her sufficiently for Shoryu to sit and be greeted by his father.

"Good morning. Shosuke." Impaired by a head injury suffered in his youth, his father's speech was halting, but well-enunciated. His intelligence hadn't been affected, but his fine motor control had suffered.

"Good morning, dad." Shoryu reciprocated his father's earnest smile.

His piece said, his father returned to the newspaper, while Shoryu dug into his breakfast.

To his surprise, he remembered more and more of his family as he stayed in his home. He couldn't clearly remember what happened in the afterlife, but it didn't seem in-character for him to have given up memories about his loved ones.

Hope warred with disgust as he considered the possibility that he had partially forgotten them for the simple reason that he been so active in his guild, his family had just slipped his mind.

He savored his rice. Girov was a damn good chef, but nothing quite beat home cooking.

In response to her asking about the biggest battle he was in, he related his role in defending a small town from Sahuagin, to the undisguised interest of the rest of his family.

Shoryu wasn't much of a storyteller, but, at least with this tale, he had told it enough times to settle into a cadence, like an old veteran with a well worn war story.

"...you should have seen me, I cut them down so fast it was like a sushi chef slicing meat. I can't tell you how smart they are, but a few of the Sahuagin targeted our guild leader and medic support Marielle, which had to be proof they were dumb because for a cleric, she's really good at _causing_ blunt force trauma. All off the Sahuagin trying to flank us got picked off by Hein's absurdly massive crossbow, and after about thirty minutes, we had figured out how to kill them in precisely the right way so that they formed a palisade around us with new fish dying at about the same rate as old corpses dissipated, so they balanced out at replacement rate…"

His father stayed home a few minutes longer than his mother, as he wasn't driving his sister to school today, but eventually said his goodbyes.

Shoryu knew that if he had asked them, they'd have taken the day off from work. But from the conspicuous lack of a horde of news vans outside their apartment building, it didn't look like the media had yet identified him as the boy formerly known as Shosuke. They were bound to find out eventually, but there wasn't any reason to make the job easier by having his parents conspicuously take a sudden vacation.

Left alone in his apartment, Shoryu wondered what to do. It was a nostalgic feeling, being home alone on a school day. He couldn't remember any single time where it happened, but sick days spent playing Elder Tale had left enough of an impression on his psyche that he could still remember the general pattern of how they went.

Unfortunately, he didn't have Elder Tale available.

What to do, what to do…

He could probably walk around outside without being swarmed by reporters; it had been pretty dark last night, he'd been in battle dress, and his ears and tail had been out. But where would he go? Money wouldn't be anything resembling a problem in the long term, but in the short term he was flat broke. All the guildmates who hadn't been transported to Elder Tale would be at school.

Going on a walk and re-familiarizing himself with the neighborhood would be a good idea, but he'd prefer to wait until the temperature rose a little.

Shoryu had never really understood the appeal of solitaire, and daytime TV was automatically out. He'd learned his lesson.

He should probably just go on the internet and catch up to everything he had missed, then. He wasn't much of a politician himself, but it always paid to know what politics looked like, so at the very least he could avoid them as much as possible.

~oOo~

The upside to Krusty's late night interview was that he'd been able to immediately address some of the concerns of those who had watched the fight against the Genius happen live.

The downside was that so much sustained action into the early morning had caused him to oversleep.

Thus, it had fallen upon Minori to do the damage control for people who'd learnt of last night's events in the morning.

That was, suffice to say, rather less than optimal.

Minori had been chosen as an intermediary because she was likely to make a good first impression. That choice had been predicated on the fact that the Round Table Alliance would be able to send more experienced diplomats across within a few days.

But of the impromptu party assembled to fight the Genius, he was the only one with any significant amount of political experience. And he had, if anything, too much political experience- people had a natural and entirely deserved distrust of politicians.

He idly chatted with his sister as they watched the news, tea cups in hand.

"...so we're fully committed to annihilating the genius threat, which we believe is wholly doable. They only have one life, and we have as many as we need."

Krusty shook his head, a little bemused. Did Minori seriously not realize the impression she was making? She was telling the truth, sure, but she didn't need to be so blatant about the Adventurer military superiority.

Reporters shouted over one another, and Minori looked briefly overwhelmed. She pointed to one of them, an older gentleman in a pinstriped suit, and they repeated their question as the rest of the crowd around Minori went silent.

"What exactly are these geniuses? Where do they come from, and what do they want?"

"We think they're aliens. We don't-"

Minori was again drowned out by the commotion of the reporters.

Reading her lips, Krusty saw her trying to ask them to be quiet. When that didn't work, she took a deep breath and yelled "PLEASE BE QUIET."

While her words were polite, the strident command tone she, like many party leaders, had developed shut up the reporters.

"We think they're aliens, _but_ we don't know for sure, because the information is just hearsay passed on from an Adventurer called Roe2. She was originally my guild leader's alternate character, and we figure if anyone would know, it would be someone not originally from this world anyways. She also told us that they want something called 'Empathion,' but we haven't been able to confirm for sure that it exists, let alone figure out what it's used for. We also don't have a clue where they're from."

Krusty frowned a little at the informal tone she'd used. He also wasn't exactly happy that she was revealing exactly how little the Round Table Alliance knew about Geniuses. At least these were relatively minor mistakes to make.

And Krusty really didn't envy the position she was in. She had to be at least a little used to being swarmed by reporters by now, but unlike previously, Minori had been ganged up on pretty much the exact moment she'd re-entered Japan. Having returned to Akihabara in a public place, news agencies had been able to set up news vans in preparation for her arriving back in Japan.

Minori probably wouldn't have to talk to reporters during her entire four hour stay, but it would still be an exhausting ordeal for her. One could say a lot of things about oligarchy, but at least Krusty didn't normally need to cater to a media apparatus unless he wanted to.

~oOo~

BologneseMaster, or more appropriately, Jouji Nakata, idly patted his son's head.

Masao Nakata was taller than him. He'd expected his son would outgrow him eventually, what with his terrible posture and poor eating habits, but it was a bit of a surprise that it happened this early.

Thankfully, being on a swivel chair cranked up as high as it went partially obscured that fact.

Jouji tapped a tripod mounted microphone with his left hand, listening through earbuds. (Headphones, unfortunately, didn't quite work with feline ears.) With his right hand on the mouse, he adjusted levels on a virtual equalizer. Then, realizing his oversensitive hearing was probably giving him a mistaken impression of what everyone else would hear anyways, he returned them to the defaults he had set before the catastrophe.

He blew off the thin covering of dust on the keyboard,

Standing up, he angled the webcam to point further down.

He'd always been thankful that he'd managed to beat the odds and make a living doing what he loved.

Now, with the ongoing situation around the portals, he was even more grateful that he worked from home. He didn't particularly want to be gaped at on talk shows or sell the hard-won items he'd acquired in Elder Tale. He set his own schedule, and could be around for the family he'd missed so much.

And if another Genius came through, or Krusty needed his assassin prowess for any reason, Jouji would be available.

As a side benefit, he got to help Akihabara's (and by extension, Silver Sword's) PR effort.

Falling into the comfort of an old routine, he turned his channel to 'on.'

"What's up everyone, this is BologneseMaster, streaming live on twitch."

~oOo~

A/N: Figuring out the timezone and calendar differences between New York and Tokyo gets really fucking annoying. Just wanted to vent.

The 5 review bar has been passed, so here's your extra (canon) interlude! I'll continue to do this in the future, so feel free to suggest topics.

~oOo~

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 **Topic: Adventurer Ambassador addresses genius Attack**

 **In: Boards ► General Discussion ► News**

 **Rock_Steady_Aim** (Original Poster)

Posted on September 15, 2019:

Link [here].

I didn't really expec to hear a lot of stuff about what exactly the monster that came through was, but that was because I expected her to act like a politician and clam up about anything that made their security look bad.

It's a little disenheartening that they're not telling us much because they're more or less equally clueless.

But hey, at least we've made first contact!

 **(Showing Page 1 of 7)**

► **KentClark**

Replied on September 15, 2019:

Still not entirely convinced this isn't a hoax. CGI has been getting really good, and if anyone were crazy enough to pull this off, it would be the Japanese.

► **Ulysses~S** (temp-banned)

Replied on September 15, 2019:

#KentClark

Dude, Occam's razor. We're talking about japan, not north korea. The chances of this being weird propaganda are lower than the chances of this being real.

Also, I got ot sell off the airplane stock a tiny bit before everyone else realized bags of holding reduce the need for transport likecrazy, so I'm pretty much rolling in money right now.

It's pretty fucking great.

► **GoodNamesWereTaken**

Replied on September 15, 2019:

#Ulysses~S

im leaning towards believing its true, and im even running a few experiments for myself to test whether it is. i don't think you're using occam's razor correctly though. the idea that everyone who dissapeared is suddenly coming back, and oh by the way they're immortal badasses now, is pretty crazy.

► **Bazi1**

Replied on September 15, 2019:

#GoodNamesWereTaken

Ulysses is correct in his usage of Occam's razor. While immortal people from another world is incredibly hard to believe, it's considerably more plausible when we know people may spontaneously disappear regardless.

What I find is a more interesting topic is whether the Genius truly is an alien.

As an addendum, what exactly did Minori mean when she said Row Two was an alternate character of her guild master? Did the Disappearance result in multiple instances of him?

I apologize for the poor english, as it is not my native tongue.

► **7456398521**

Replied on September 15, 2019:

Guys, you're all probably missing the most important takeaway from this: it was a side mention, but it looks like everyone is the same gender *and* species as their avatar. The species thing aside, they treated the gender dysphoria with transformation potions. I get that the magic will probably have some weird restrictions to it preventing everyone from becoming immortal, godlike, Ubermensch, but still. Cancer? Transform to your pre-cancer state. Aging? Just transform into a younger you. Lost a limb/major accident? Same thing.

It's not quite on par with the bullshit immortality Adventurers get, but it's still pretty good.

► **PIZZA/LOVER** (temp-banned)

Replied on September 15, 2019:

#7456398521

Yeah, transformation potions are pretty crazy, even though they're temporary. Actually, the fact that they're temporary might even be an asset, because we can generate extra mass- you can transform someone big, cut off

[mod note: censored]

► **7456398521**

Replied on September 15, 2019:

#PIZZA/LOVER

What the actual fuck?

► **Ulysses~S** (temp-banned)

Replied on September 15, 2019:

#PIZZA/LOVER

Huh, I might want to invest in a biofuel company, then.

► **Abusive_Relationship** (Moderator)

Replied on September 15, 2019:

#PIZZA/LOVER

Jesus, I get that your intentions are noble, but that's just gruesome. You're not posting that maliciously so you're just getting a temporary time out, but think before you post next time.

#Ulysses~S

Don't encourage him. Also, ew.

 **End of Page. 1,** **2** **,** **3** **,** **4** **,** **5** **,** **6** **,** **7**


	12. Chapter 12

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 12**

~oOo~

Michael had found it impossible to focus on school.

He would have blamed his crime fighting exploits earlier in the day, but this was pretty par for the course.

Still, he was thankful that his classes went uneventfully, as the consequences for being found out would be, if not necessarily dire, then at least unpredictable. Michael much preferred acting proactively than reactively, the events of this morning notwithstanding.

He whiled away his time researching Elder Tale's game mechanics and trawling the internet for anyone else who'd discovered how to use magic.

To his surprise, the earliest mentions of Elder Tale style magic, ignoring the sudden surge of people screwing around for attention right after the Disappearance, had actually happened about a month before Minori crossed over.

He couldn't confirm anything, of course- most of the reports were sure to be crackpots or people who wanted internet fame, and he didn't doubt that the people who actually had figured out how to use magic would have been secretive about it, like him.

Still, it was useful information.

At least gym no longer looked like it would ever be a problem again. Not that he'd been unfit even before getting his Monk occupation, but it was certainly helping.

And it was an occupation, not a class.

It was more than a little humbling to realize that he was an NPC.

It was also more than a little convenient. His xp gain was gimped, but it didn't seem like he'd need to kill monsters to gain levels. Instead, he could simply train- either regularly, by exercising, or through repetitive use of his class abilities.

It also explained why he couldn't gain the Border Patrol subclass- on review, the "quest" he had gotten was actually a notification that he'd gained the "Patrolman" sub-occupation. Functionally speaking, it was identical to the Border Patrol subclass, although the user interface treated it differently.

It looked like his morning runs would become a regular thing.

He left school early, choosing to skip out on MOBA club.

With his backpack on, he couldn't jog unless he wanted to risk damaging his school materials, but he still walked home rather than take the bus. That would only have an xp reward in the low double digits, but at the level he was at, he could use all the help he got.

He shivered involuntarily, as he recalled being shot at. He'd been so blasé about it at the time. But he wasn't an adventurer or a main character, and as he'd once heard in a zen koan, people die when they are killed.

He wasn't particularly durable, at least for now, and he didn't have healer support. Even a bullet would be enough to put him underground.

Reaching his apartment building, he noticed an unfamiliar car parked on the other side of the road.

It wasn't particularly sleek or polished, but he'd lived here long enough to know that it wasn't one of the neighbor's, or one of the common visitors.

Still, that wouldn't have been enough to raise his suspicion, if it weren't for the man leaning on it.

He didn't wearing a tuxedo and sunglasses, and was playing with his phone rather than looking around like a hawk. His dirty blond hair wasn't close-cropped, instead falling down to his shoulders.

But something about him felt off, and Michael decided that it was probably a good idea to pay attention to his newfound Monk instincts. Which may or may not have been placebos, but whatever.

Keeping a close eye on the man, Michael walked quietly to the apartment building's door.

Of course, as soon as he had his hand on the door handle, the man looked up.

"Hey man, wait a second."

Michael didn't like the sound of that.

But if this guy was armed, two inches of wood wouldn't save his life, so Michael let go of the doorknob and turned around.

"Yeah?"

Carefully keeping his hands in his pockets, Michael slipped on the brass knuckles, which he'd been carrying all day.

"I'm just going to cut to the chase." And without any other preamble, the man whipped a badge out of his pocket.

"Agent Faraday, FBI."

Michael gave him an askance look. "Bullshit."

Faraday shrugged, and revealed his phone screen. On it, Michael could see them from another angle. Tracing the view, Michael looked up to see a surveillance camera.

"I'm still not buying it."

Faraday tapped his phone screen. The image switched to Michael's father sitting in a cubicle. He tapped it again, and the image switched to his mother smoking outside an office building.

Michael felt a pit growing in his stomach.

"What do you want."

Faraday sighed. "Look, I can tell I'm giving you a bad impression, so I'm just going to explain something. Nothing that happens here, short of you attacking me, will lead to anything that affects your parents that you don't explicitly consent to beforehand. I'm not doing this to threaten you, just to prove that I'm serious. And yes, 'affect your parents' includes stuff that affects you."

Faraday motioned towards his side. "Look, I'm not even armed. We're trying to do this in good faith."

Michael relaxed his grip on the brass knuckles. It wasn't like they'd do much good anyways, if the man was armed.

"Okay, but what do you want?"

"Well, my bosses want to get in touch with the first American to openly reveal they have powers. If you consent, I'm here to drive you to them. You will, of course, be able to call your parents and notify them of what's happening." Faraday smiled. "Personally, I want an autograph."

Michael relaxed. Well, with how little he'd worked at keeping his secret identity secret, it wasn't exactly a surprise the government had figured it out. At least this wasn't the imprisonment and dissection nightmare he'd irrationally feared would happen.

~oOo~

Prime Minister Nakatani had genuinely enjoyed his talk with Minori. She had been endearing, in a rather inept way. She had obviously been trained to deal with crisis situations, and her confidence and general cheeriness had done wonders to calm the shock of the public at the return of the adventurers. Though on the other hand, she tended to be rather unintentionally threatening.

What was the quote? Something about organizing over a thousand adventurers to depose a king? His defense minister had had conniptions once it had sunk in that the Disappeared had turned themselves into an informal, immortal army.

But without hesitation, she'd immediately shown him how to channel his own abilities, and by extension that magic wasn't limited to adventurers.

Perhaps a cannier ambassador would have extracted some sort of deal for the information, but she'd freely volunteered it. Perhaps only to move on from the question of how someone could become an Adventurer, but he appreciated it regardless.

Of course, he was entirely cognizant that her naivete was a calculated move, if not on her part, than on the part of this "Round Table Alliance." It made her easier to trust, and automatically smoothed over at least some diplomatic snafus. But as diplomacy went, it was still far less underhanded than what he was used to, so his view of her hadn't been particularly affected.

Krusty... he was a different matter.

The son of a member of the opposition party, by all accounts (that is, Minori's) a capable general, a Harvard graduate, and, of course, a near-immortal pseudo-ubermensch capable of superhuman feats.

He'd easily maintained his composure in an impromptu, unscripted televised interview despite the late hour and doubtlessly being off balance from the fight he'd just been through.

Nakatani would have held a lot of respect for him, if he wasn't so clearly a threat.

Of course, he didn't think Krusty was anything more than indirectly responsible for the "Genius," incident. There were too many ways a false flag attack could have gone wrong, and public opinion was difficult to predict even for an experienced politician like him.

But he was all too aware how Krusty came off in the wake of it- a self-sacrificing leader, both capable and trusted by his subordinates.

He wasn't quite old enough to seriously pose a threat as an insurgent candidate, should he choose to run in an election, but his popularity bolstered his mother's political power, and that was concerning.

The prime minister's phone rang.

This would be Krusty. He let it ring for a few seconds, to avoid giving the impression that he had been eagerly waiting for the call, then picked it up.

Smiling to get himself in the proper mindset, he said "Hello, Mr. Kounoike. How are you doing?"

"Good, sir. Thank you for asking."

"Good, good. Now, I'm going to have to apologize in advance- I'd rather sit down and have a friendly conversation over some beers, but we're both busy men and I have a lot to ask, so I'm sorry if I come off a little, ah, interrogative."

"Not a problem, sir. I'm sorely in need of information as well, so I hope it's not a problem if I need to ask a few questions myself."

"Of course, of course. I understand that your main priority is looking out for your guildmates."

Nakatani paused briefly, waiting for a denial or patriotic affirmation that Krusty wanted what was best for Japan as a whole, but none were forthcoming. That hadn't been unexpected, but it was a little disappointing regardless.

Nakatani continued. "Now, I received a fairly complete rundown of the political situation on the other side from Minori, but she didn't go very far into the specifics. Would you care to elaborate?"

The line went quiet, crackling slightly. "Hmm, I suppose it would be best to start at the beginning. Or rather, before the beginning."

Nakatani recognized an orator's cadence when he heard one, the inflections precisely chosen and words carefully chosen.

"Back when Elder Tale was just a game, longstanding guilds generally fell into three categories. Smaller guilds, where players simply enjoyed playing with their friends, mid sized guilds united by the shared interests of their members, and the largest guilds, such as my own, which recruited fairly indiscriminately and maintained coherency simply by having their inflow of new players match or exceed their outflow of now-experienced players looking for something tailored more closely to them."

Krusty paused, possibly to think, possibly for emphasis. Nakatani gave an evaluating hum.

"The size of the guild typically dictated how they played. Smaller guilds would participate in quests needing only a full party, at most, mid-sized guilds would participate in twenty four man raids, and the larger guilds would participate in forty eight, sixty four, or even ninety six man raids. Generally speaking, guilds would participate in events requiring at most a third of their forces, and usually less than that, due to the difficulty of organizing their player bases. Some small, but incredibly dedicated groups- like the famous Debauchery Tea Party- could punch above their weight by virtue of their dedicated players, but in general the rule held."

Krusty cleared his throat.

"So when the Catastrophe happened, most of the high-tier phantasmal items were already concentrated in the hands of the larger guilds. Due to the increased risk of fighting monsters, these sorts of well-equipped guilds were, by and large, the only ones to keep accruing any notable amount of wealth, at least in the initial months. This led to smaller guilds dissolving, and the accretion of more and more power in larger guilds. This happened in more or less the same fashion across Yamato, China, and from what I've heard from Kanami, the Scandinavian server as well."

Krusty paused. This time, Nakatani knew it was for emphasis.

"That's where events diverged depending on location. With the intercity transport gates offline, guilds were generally contained within their own regions. That, predictably, aggravated already-extant rivalries between guilds. In some locations, such as Susukino and Minami, a single already-powerful guild simply crushed their competitors. Cities with entrenched rivalries but no clearly dominant guild, such as Nakasu or the Big Apple, typically fell into internecine warfare. Other cities were abandoned outright, for whatever reason, such as Shibuya. But where the right combination of equally matched guilds and a lack of animosity occurred, alliances formed to police the Adventurers and maintain order."

Krusty continued, finishing off his speech. "From these, cities can afford to look outwards- Plant Hwyaden chose conquest as their objective, while we decided on something more akin to nation building."

He was probably playing up his own side to look better, but Nakatani found himself believing most of what Krusty said. "I see. And how do these factions interact with the local governments?"

"Landers, prior to the Catastrophe, already hired adventurers for various reasons. Things aren't quite the same, but we started with the equivalent of a working business relationship. From there, Plant Hwyaden did the equivalent of becoming Westlande's military-industrial complex, while we became something of an allied city state to Eastal."

Reading between the lines, that meant that Plant Hwyaden had a closer relationship to their respective polity than the Round Table Alliance. Perhaps they were superior at diplomacy?

Regardless, Nakatani felt it was the right time to pose the question he really wanted answered.

"And how has the ability to convert ordinary people into Adventurers affected relations?"

"..."

"Do you mean the ability for ordinary people to cast magic?"

"No, I'm specifically referring to making people immortal."

"We… can't do that. If we could we'd spread the information as far as possible- there aren't many good reasons to prevent anyone who wants to become immortal from doing so. Or at least, the benefits far outweigh the negatives."

Strange, a flat refusal? Had he misread Minori? Nakatani decided to push a little more.

"Minori implied that you had the capabilities to do so."

"Hmm. Oh. _Oh._ That could explain things. Minori said she posted an image of most of Log Horizon and Crescent Moon. Can you pull it up, please?"

Nakatani did so, borrowing their smartphone.

"Has the family of the boy with light, curly hair labeled 'Rundelhaus Code' been identified?"

Nakatani frowned. "Not to my knowledge, no."

"Have the others photographed had their families identified?"

"Yes, all of them."

"Then that doesn't quite confirm it, but I believe it's likely that he was a former Lander, turned into an Adventurer by Shiroe."

"How?"

"Shiroe has what's known as an overskill- he's taken a game mechanic, and determined how to use it in a different fashion by exploiting how real life is considerably more permissive than Elder Tale. Specifically, he has the ability to make binding, magical contracts. He's kept the details secret, but it's well known that he's used the ability at least twice, so far- to bind Minori to a talisman, and to purchase all of Yamato's unclaimed territory simultaneously, before deeding it to Yamato itself, to prevent adventurers from making claims that superseded those made by landers."

"And what reason would he have to keep his method secret?"

"Most likely? He's a scribe and thus probably requires difficult-to-obtain materials, and most overskills can't be taught regardless."

That didn't bode well. To have a monopoly on immortality would make him the most powerful man on either earth.

"I've heard a little about Shiroe from Minori. What kind of man is he?"

"He's… Competent, I suppose, is the best way to describe him. He's rather infamous because to an outside observer his actions may seem malevolent, but I've never known him to be anything other than altruistic. As an enchanter, he's extremely experienced, and well known from his skills as a strategist."

Or to sum it up in a single word, Shiroe was dangerous. He'd need to speak to his advisors. And possibly make plans to suck up to the enchanter: he wasn't, after all, getting any younger.

"By the way," Krusty added, "what plans does the Japanese government have for re-integrating those Adventurers who wish to return, once we're able to increase our portal creation capability?"

At least this was familiar territory.

"We have a large, mostly complete database of families affected by the Disappearance. All the legislative groundwork has already been set down, actually- In the early months of the crisis, my predecessor pushed for laws addressing possible outcomes to be passed in order to appear productive."

"That's good. What about schooling? Many players were in middle or high school when the Catastrophe happened."

"Two, possibly three years is a fair amount of time, but those who wish to re-enter school or take the high school equivalency test will be accommodated. They might be held back a year or two, but it's not like Adventurers are lacking for time." Despite knowing Krusty couldn't see it, Nakatani had a wry grin on his face. "I actually have a few more questions to ask, but we're coming up to the end of our time. Would you be amenable to exchanging a few emails?"

Krusty replied in the affirmative, they said a few pleasantries, and the phone line went dead.

Nakatani sighed. He could see why Minori had been keeping that regular people could be turned into adventurers a secret. He'd do so as well, as he didn't fancy dealing with the social unrest were the secret revealed.

He lit a cigarette and relaxed for the next few minutes, after returning his guard's phone. Then, he made his call to the president of the United States. A politician's work was never done. Or to put it another way, there was no rest for the wicked.

~oOo~

A/N: The phone call went a _lot_ longer than I expected, so I apologize.

As always, thanks to Mizu25 my beta.

And now, your interlude, inspired b of spacebattles. If you're reading this after 2016, greetings from the past, and hopefully your future looks nothing at all like this. 5 reviews for an interlude is still ongoing.

~oOo~

(Incredibly) Noncanon interlude: International Response

~oOo~

 **United States**

President Hillary Clinton looked at her vice president, Donald Trump. What might be described as grins on anyone else spread across their faces, rictuses of twisted glee perfectly mirrored across the two conspirators.

The president opened her mouth, untold horrors escaping as her gaping maw gasped in air.

"Wᴇ ᴡɪʟʟ ɴᴏ ʟᴏɴɢᴇʀ ʙᴇ ᴏғ ᴏғ ᴍᴏʀᴛᴀʟ ғʟᴇsʜ, ᴀɴᴅ ᴛʜᴏᴜɢʜ ᴡᴇ ʀᴏʙʙᴇᴅ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴇʟᴇᴄᴛɪᴏɴ ɪɴ ᴡʜɪᴄʜ ᴡᴇ ʜᴀᴅ ᴡʀᴏᴜɢʜᴛ sᴏ ɢʀᴇᴀᴛ ᴀɴ ᴇᴠɪʟ, sᴏ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴡᴇ ᴄᴏᴜʟᴅ ɴᴇᴠᴇʀ ᴀɢᴀɪɴ ᴀᴘᴘᴇᴀʀ ғᴀɪʀ ᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇ ᴇʏᴇs ᴏғ Mᴇɴ, ᴏᴜʀ sᴘɪʀɪᴛs ᴡɪʟʟ ʏᴇᴛ ᴀʀɪsᴇ ᴏᴜᴛ ᴏғ ᴛʜᴇ ᴅᴇᴇᴘ ᴀɴᴅ ᴘᴀss ᴀs ᴀ sʜᴀᴅᴏᴡ ᴀɴᴅ ᴀ ʙʟᴀᴄᴋ ᴡɪɴᴅ ᴏᴠᴇʀ ᴛʜᴇ sᴇᴀ, ᴀɴᴅ ᴄᴀᴍᴇ ʙᴀᴄᴋ ᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇ Uɴɪᴛᴇᴅ Sᴛᴀᴛᴇs ᴀɴᴅ ᴛᴏ Wᴀsʜɪɴɢᴛᴏɴ DC ᴛʜᴀᴛ ɪs ᴏᴜʀ ʜᴏᴍᴇ."

"Yes, we will do the not good thing. The ones across the water will learn that we are strong and they are not. If the death of them is because of us, our power grows greater and we stop the problem.!"

Vice President Trump's hairdo made a pleased susurration, agreeing with its master.

Both cackled, as they continued to plan their strike against the adventurers. After all, if nuclear weapons couldn't be used to farm xp, what were they good for?

Far away, one man practiced the use of Orb of Lava. He knew what the establishment was planning, and he knew that he needed to _Bern. Them. Down._

 **North Korea**

Un's foreign policy minister kneeled.

"Great! Leader! Un!"

With each word, the minister smashed his head into to the cement to show his deference.

Un, in his great and transcendental mercy, held his hand out to signal that the minister had shown an appropriate amount of deference.

Tears streaming down his cheek in virtually orgasmic bliss, the minister continued. "The imperialist Japanese have acquired filthy pigdog video game players who they claim are immortal to fight for their cause."

Un shifted slightly, the light cascading down his rugged, manly features. The interplay of light and dark over the folds of skin on his face conveyed emotions the minister was barely capable of interpreting.

His sobbing changed from joyous to saturnine at the intolerable suffering of his God-King-President. He murmured maledictions under his breath at the barbarous westerners and their abominable puppet.

"Fear not, I will deal with this threat."

Un's voice came honeyed and sweet, yet simultaneously thundering and authoritative.

His body glowed, and golden armor enveloped him. He levitated off the ground, breaking the sound barrier as he left the inner sanctum.

A rapturous expression was left on the minister's face as he toppled, every synapse overloaded. He died in pure bliss.

 **An Unidentified Island Nation**

The elderly lady set down her cup, pinky extended.

The city still smouldered, but the rioting had ceased for a spot of afternoon tea.

The atmosphere was clogged with smoke, a side effect of the gutted environmental regulations.

But it had all been worth it, to maintain her power. She had known the Disappearance would happen. After all, her immortality had been gained in Theldesia. But it had come conditionally, for there could only be one Rose Garden Princess. So she had forced the nation to a state where she could seize back power, all to guard against the eventuality that one would come from the world of what the new generation referred to as "Elder Tale."

It had been a hard decision to make, sacrificing her country for her own well being.

But Elizabeth was a hard woman.


	13. Chapter 13

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 13**

~oOo~

Isuzu sorely missed Minori's presence as their understrength group fought through hordes of minion level sprites. Individually they were almost laughably weak, but their sheer concentration made fighting through them a slog.

And to make it worse, these monsters were so far below her in level, she didn't even gain xp from defeating them.

Being showered in blood every time Tohya swung his sword was also irritating, but less so than the lack of adequate loot.

Isuzu switched her in-progress song to a defensive one. Rundelhaus pulled aggro to himself by casting area of effect spells, freezing and shocking the monsters.

Cooldown over, Tohya cast Samurai Challenge, drawing attention back to him.

Sprites divebombed the groups their hoarse screaming creating an ungodly cacophony that set Minori's teeth on edge. She'd heard someone on raid chat compare them to "miniature Stukas," but at least planes only carried a limited armament.

"Isuzu! I need your team supporting Marielle's!"

"Gotcha, Shiroe!"

Isuzu directed her party to start moving.

Leadership was proving to be exactly as difficult as she imagined, but she had been the best choice to temporarily replace Minori. Tohya would probably have been a better commander, but it was difficult for him to pay attention to health bars and tank at the same time.

As a bard, Isuzu's eyes were already glued to her teammate's status screens.

Serara summoned her companion, and her wolf rammed into a cluster of sprites blocking their way.

They took advantage of the gap to speed up, but sprites spawned in so rapidly it was quickly plugged.

Over the span of two minutes, Isuzu's party slowly made their way to Marielle's group using her friend's list awareness of where she was.

Marielle was well within the green range of her health bar, but the low-level Crescent Moon guildmates she was partied with were far into the red. Still, all were alive.

Rundelhaus and Tohya kept the sprites distracted as Isuzu and Serara cast buffs and heals on the hurt adventurers.

"Alright, we're spreading back out."

Shiroe didn't reply, but Isuzu knew he'd heard her.

Slowly returning to their original position, Isuzu's group went back to drawing aggro.

They wouldn't make a significant dent in the sprite populations, but that wasn't the intention. They just needed to keep sprites concentrated here rather than leaving towards the city, at least until someone fixed the leaky mana sinks installed to hold the energy required to send people through portals.

At least they'd installed them outside of city limits.

Eventually, she received word that the mana sinks were fixed, and the concentration of sprites finally started to decrease.

As they wiped out the last few monsters, Isuzu came to the uncomfortable realization that if ordinary monsters were drawn to concentrations of mana, why not geniuses as well?

Hopefully they came in limited supply, or they'd have serious problems on their hands.

~oOo~

Predictably, Michael and the FBI agent had gotten stuck in traffic. It hadn't been what Michael was expecting out of the whole "abducted by the government" experience, but it did make sense that they weren't trying to draw attention to themselves by blazing through stop lights and tearing down the asphalt at top speed.

In the meantime, they whiled away the time by chatting.

Faraday was surprisingly personable, and revealed that he was actually fairly new to the job.

When asked for why he'd been chosen over other agents, a brief look of pain crossed his face, and his cheery demeanor vanished. He muttered something about an accident, then dissembled.

That of course made Michael curious, even though on an intellectual level he knew the answer was probably classified and/or personal, and while his questions failed to get a straight answer out of Faraday, he did learn that the man was a huge sci-fi fan. His request for an autograph had evidently been less because he was into TMNT or Elder Tale, and more because he'd grown into something of a superhero buff after getting into the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

They'd found a mutual interest in Star Citizen, and by the time Faraday had gotten around to asking Michael about how, exactly, he'd figured out magic, Michael was more than ready to tell him.

He was, admittedly, a little suspicious that Faraday had been buttering him up specifically to get him to reveal his secrets, but it's not like they had been particularly difficult to figure out.

Really, he estimated there were probably already tens of thousands of other Americans who'd figured out the same things he had; everyone else had just been better at hiding it.

Traffic was thoroughly stopped, so MIchael and Faraday just got out of the car.

"You're going to need to pull out your gun for this, you need some sort of equipment to choose a class."

Faraday looked uncomfortable. "Eh, I don't really want to freak out everyone else. Is there something else I could use?"

Michael shrugged. "I have no clue; I didn't play Elder Tale before the Disappearance, and it's not like there were enough high-ranking devs left on earth to administrate their servers afterwards. I've done some research, but almost exclusively on my own class. Maybe you should look at the classlist?"

"Okay." Faraday pulled out his phone and went quiet. After a while, he began listing the classes. "Assassin, for high alpha strike and speed but low defense, Bard for buffs, Cleric for healing, Druid for utility…" Michael put away his own phone and listened.

Faraday finished. "Any ideas?"

Michael shrugged. "Not really. Actually," he added, "Medium is the generic class- here in North America, we have the 'Medicine Man' class."

Faraday shrugged his chin. "Hmm. I'm one thirty sixth native american on my Mom's side. Think that could work?"

"Eh. It depends on whether you have an appropriate item. Some kind of charm, maybe?"

Faraday patted down his pockets as if they'd reveal more than his wallet and keys, but they didn't have anything in them.

Taking one look at his car, however, a grin split Faraday's face.

Reaching in through the window, he pulled the ornament he had hanging from his mirror out of the vehicle.

He giddily revealed it to Michael.

It was a small dreamcatcher, made out of willow. Michael examined it, and a readout popped up.

"A device to store bad dreams, protecting its user and, if necessary, damaging their enemies."

Michael started to relay this to Faraday, but was cut off.

"Holy shit, it works! This is fantastic! I'm just gonna-" Faraday screwed up his face.

Michael blinked in confusion, before realizing what was going to happen.

"Wait! Don't!"

Faraday stopped trying to cast a spell. "What? Why not?"

"Running out of mana makes you sleepy. You don't want to do that when you have to drive a car."

"Aww. Well, that's a good point, I guess."

They spent the better part of the next fifteen minutes reading articles on the Elder Tale wiki, before traffic finally started to move again.

They made to step in the car, when they heard the crack of a pistol, followed by the explosion of one of the car's tires.

The bystanders that didn't pull their phones out immediately started fleeing, hopping over the hoods of cars to get off the highway.

Four men, brandishing what was obviously gang insignia, stepped into view.

The lead gangster put his gun away and pulled out a butterfly knife in an elegant maneuver.

"You thought you were a motherfucking hero, putting my buddies in jail? Think again, 'cuz we're gonna fucking _bury_ you."

~oOo~

Every so often, when the younger members of Log Horizon were distracted for some reason or another, Log Horizon's older members liked to take an evening to relax, down a few drinks, and enjoy themselves.

It had been Naotsugu's turn to pick the destination, and he'd decided that the five of them (plus Marielle and Henrietta) would go bowling.

The pins tumbled, as Shiroe knocked down a respectable eight of them down. With his second throw, he reduced the split to a solitary pin.

The pins reset themselves, and Akatsuki casually bowled her eight straight strike.

"Nice job, again."

Akatsuki smiled. "Thank you, my lord."

Nyanta and Naotsugu were too absorbed with trash talking to really pay attention, while Tetra was at least equally absorbed with scarfing down pizza.

Henrietta politely clapped, while Marielle cheered enthusiastically.

Naotsugu stopped bantering with Nyanta long enough to pick up his massive, twenty kilogram bowling ball and throw it. What he missed in technique he made up with in sheer power, the force of the ball hitting the ground alone enough to cause two pins to tumble.

Predictably, his ball ended up in the gutter.

He ignored the manager yelling at him to not break the equipment and Nyanta's jibes as he threw again, knocking another four pins over.

The group next to theirs, an assortment of Lander nobles, looked at him with a mix of amusement and annoyance.

Shiroe thought they looked rather strange, the gaudy rainbow carpet and faux-neon lighting installed by the Adventurer owner contrasting with their formal court dress. The flowing solid-color dresses on the women perhaps matched the color scheme, but the formal tuxedos on the men were a little much.

His group probably looked strange to the nobles as well- the last he had heard, Adventurer customs (e.g., bowling) were the height of fashion for Landers, nowadays, and with their casual clothing, the Log Horizon members might seem underdressed to the nobles.

As Nyanta stepped up for his turn to bowl, one of the Landers got up, to the obvious surprise of his group.

He made his way to Shiroe, and Shiroe stood up, anticipating the Lancer's intentions.

The Lander gave a formal bow, his hand over his chest.

"Am I correct in saying I have the pleasure of meeting the famed strategist, Archmage Shiroe?"

Shiroe returned the bow, hands to his sides.

"Just call me Shiroe. Who are you?"

Shiroe mentally hit himself for being informal, but the Lander didn't seem to mind.

"I am Classiel, second son of the Marquis D'varte. I must say, I'm incredibly grateful, on a personal level, for your actions. Had I been asleep for even a few minutes longer due to the genius you stopped on this 'Shibuya Raid,' I would potentially been a little too late to be fashionably late at an event I was attending that night."

That was a joke, right? Shiroe forced a laugh, but the man looked hurt, so he quickly stopped.

"Well, I'm glad you were not-on-time on time. What sort of event were you attending?"

"Why, a play describing your own heroic exploits in unifying the Adventurers of Akihabara!"

He had a play written about him? That was… strange.

"Indeed, we are very thankful for your actions in consolidating the Adventurers then; when us Landers find ourselves in sticky situations, it's very reassuring to know that Adventurers are willing to rescue us like damsels in distress."

Shiroe gave something of a pained half smile. Was that intended to be a joke?

" _Yes, it's a joke, laugh."_

Shiroe avoided starting as Akatsuki's voice came over through telepathy. By now, they simply kept their channels open at all times, when not talking to other people, for the sheer convenience it offered. It helped that neither him nor Akatsuki were particularly vocal people, and thus didn't annoy each other with constant chatter.

Shiroe did his best to laugh, although the noble (Cassiel, right?) looked a little put off.

"We appreciate the chance to help."

The noble nodded. "Truly, you are honorable men and women." He paused. "Though, I admit, I am a little concerned with all the momentous change these portals will leave behind, with adventurers leaving for their homeworld. Already, we've had a sharp increase in monsters. Still, I am glad you have chosen to send the princess as one of the first across into your homeland. It is a great source of reassurance that one of our own will be able to interact with your countrymen and government."

Now Shiroe got where he was going at. Obviously, this noble and his companions were suspicious about how Lenessia hadn't been sent across on the first opening of the permanent transport portals, as promised.

This would be tricky to believably explain. Shiroe felt a pit growing in his stomach. He had never really enjoyed directly interacting with other people. Through a screen was fine, but in person was a another matter.

" _My lord, Henrietta says he seeks reassurance that Adventurers will not abandon Landers."_

Or maybe it wouldn't be tricky, because he'd been misreading the noble.

Shiroe badly wished there was some way to gain a "charisma" ability, like in tabletop RPGs.

"There's no cause for worry: the Round Table Alliance is fully confident of its ability to defend Akihabara and the surrounding areas from direct results of mana accumulation, and we won't, under any circumstances, leave Landers to suffer their fate alone against hordes of monsters."

He just _knew_ he sounded like a stilted robot. Still, at least having a rehearsed speech on hand was better than stumbling over every third word as he tried to gather his thoughts.

The noble laughed. "I am heartened by how seriously you take our safety." He clapped Shiroe on the shoulder. "Good luck, in whatever your pursuit." The noble returned to his party.

Shiroe faced back towards his own friends. "Has anyone been bowling for me?"

He saw his scorecard, and the extra strike on it.

"Thanks, Akatsuki."

~oOo~

Canon Interlude: Krusty plays an FPS

~oOo~

"Alright team. The counter-terrorists are be tough opponents, and we might be a little behind, but I know that if we work together we can-"

"Will you SHUT your FAT FUCKING FACE you MOUTH-BREATHING IMBECILE?"

Krusty gaped.

His screen zoomed out, and his avatar slumped backwards.

"Cᴏᴜɴᴛᴇʀ ᴛᴇʀʀᴏʀɪsᴛs ᴡɪɴ."

He took his headset off to stem the tide of abuse thrown at him.

He looked at his sister, who was slumped back in her chair, mouse twitching from side to side.

On her screen, he could see a killstreak notification.

She took her hands off the mouse and keyboard as her match ended, and stretched backwards.

She yawned, then said, "lost again bro?"

"How in the world did you convince me to play this game."

She shrugged. "I dunno. Elder Tale isn't coming back up and you weren't in the mood for some crummy mobile game?"

Frustrated, Krusty pulled his hand down his face.

"But no one wants to cooperate in this game, how are we supposed to win?"

Krusty's sister shook her long black hair out and hummed. Tying it in a knot, she said. "Counterstrike is all about individual skill. You just gotta get good."

"Multiplayer video games are all about coordination, though. No individual player can carry the team. They're not designed that way."

Again, she shrugged. "Tell that to me and my Desert Eagle."

Thoroughly sick and tired of getting yelled at, Krusty closed the game. Weren't his enhanced reflexes supposed to help in tasks like these?


	14. Chapter 14

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 14**

~oOo~

There was no good and no evil, only the will to power.

So Indicus didn't feel at all guilty as she manipulated Lord Marves.

He hung on her every word as she gestured over the railing, pointing to the Tailors, Knife Grinders, and Fullers.

She explained how Plant Hwyaden had once again increased the quality of its Tailors (absolute bullshit, of course; their Tailors had never been the bottleneck) and that would therefore lead to even finer materials for Westlande's nobility to enjoy.

When Marves asked about the Fullers and Knife Grinders, she played into his expectations and dismissed them as nothing more than laborers.

With the fact that their subclasses casually violated conservation of mass, that was of course incredibly erroneous. But Marves had been raised with the understanding that, even if peasants were far below him, artisans were at least a cut above lowly manual laborers.

Knife Grinders, with just a water and a stone, could repair not just weapons, but armour. Everyone else had been too dumb to realize what that meant, but Indicus had seen the implications immediately.

Obviously, they didn't act reductively, because what use would it be to make armor thinner?

So they had to act additively, creating more of the material they worked on through some sort of magic.

The thin metal under her feet creaked, as she directed Marves to follow her to less secret, and less important parts of the factory.

Fullers, despite being a 'realistic' subclass, could adjust clothing. With the ability to make clothes fit on larger frames than they had been made for, they were therefore able to generate rare materials straight out of the nether for no cost other than time, effort, and mana.

Indicus nodded, murmured, and smiled as Marves said some trivial banality about how this innovation demonstrated the clear ideological superiority of the Holy Empire Westlande over the Freedom Cities Eastal.

Indicus didn't know where the material came from, and to be honest, she didn't give a damn. Because with Knife Grinders, Fullers, and Tailors working in tandem, she could manufacture rare quest drops then immediately turn them into expensive clothes without squandering the time of Plant Hwyaden's higher level players.

She clasped her hands behind the her back, above the bow of her french maid outfit. As she walked, Indicus sashayed side to side, just a little bit.

The trade of luxury goods was one more way to get the nobility of Westlande under her thumb. And they didn't even realize what she was doing.

She was nothing but polite towards Lord Marves despite being well known for her short temper. Despite his bizarre looks, his sickly face and fish like eyes, she pretended to actually like the man.

So Marves put two and two together, helped along by her Elder Maid subclass and desperate desire for validation, and decided she was simply particularly enamored with him, and of course, his social status.

The influence she had gained over the ugly, and likely inbred elf noble was a little hilarious. With just a well placed suggestion, she'd gotten him to hare off to Akihabara, nominally to embarrass the Cowens. He'd been nothing more than an oblivious distraction, of course, but despite Nureha getting in the way of Indicus's war, it was still _incredibly_ gratifying to have that sort of power over a person.

Nureha was a Courtesan. A whore princess, to use the literal meaning of the term. The masses loved her, and the nobility viewed her as a peer. But while she pranced around, Indicus wielded the real influence.

~oOo~

Princess Lennisia lay on her back, arm over her brow. Her feet fell over the edge of the massive bed, fuzzy slippers hanging loosely off her toes. Her long, silver hair wasn't in its usual orderly state, instead laying splayed over the mattress.

She actively avoided trying to avoid thinking about anything in particular, instead attempting to simply relish the experience of lounging around in her pajamas while having absolutely nothing to do.

But the very reason for why she had nothing to do had the audacity to occupy her thoughts.

For once in her life, she'd actually been prepared for a diplomatic engagement. But random chance had blocked her from performing a job she was, if not looking forward too, then at least not wholly opposed to doing.

It wasn't like she wouldn't go across, of course. She was sitting at the very top of the list in terms of who'd get to go over, and as an apology for failing to bring her over the first time around, the Round Table had even agreed to send her handmaiden Elissa over with her.

But still, her feelings were conflicted.

Did she or did she not want to go to Earth?

She knew, more than most Landers, how Adventurers acted. How they thought, their social customs, the new ideas the brought- all these were things she had experience with.

But even with that knowledge, even knowing that most Adventurers were good people, and that they change they brought was overwhelmingly good, there was still the feeling that things were just going too fast.

She missed the feeling that everything was simple, and that a smart enough person (if not necessarily her) could look at the world, nod, and say that it made sense.

But the Adventurers looked at the world, nodded to themselves, and declared that it could be improved.

Most changes had been for the best. Tasty food, new music, and the introduction of games and sports not known to Yamato had made life better, for nobility and commoners alike.

That didn't stop change from being scary.

It was paradoxical and intoxicating, the feeling that Landers were both gaining and losing control over their own destinies.

Not that that mattered to her, of course. Lenessia was lazy, but she wasn't a fool. She'd be married to some nobleman, pop out a few children, and occasionally sit and look pretty for official portraits.

Unbidden, Krusty's face flashed in her mind.

She suppressed it as well as possible. It wasn't healthy to dwell over the impossible. Krusty viewed her like a little sister anyways.

Though she was a little embarrassed to admit that Krusty's presence on the other side made her just a teensy bit more eager to finally get across.

For all that she reluctantly enjoyed the company of Reize, Akatsuki, Marrielle, and her other friends, Krusty had still been the first adventurer to approach her, the first to look past her social status and attempt to befriend her.

Less 'attempt' and more 'succeed,' she had to admit.

Stupid glasses-wearing monster.

~oOo~

"Just shoot him! Please!"

"Again, I can't! I wasn't kidding when I said I wasn't armed."

Michael groaned.

Sparks flew off the concrete, as yet another knife was thrown by the gangsters. Who, despite their tough words, were perfectly fine with sitting back and trying to puzzle through their new abilities.

Michael could hardly believe it- they had been smart (or lucky) enough to figure out how to unlock the Assassin class, but hadn't even done any research on how to actually use it.

So they sloppily threw knives from a crate filled with them, rather than actually bothering to close the distance to Michael and Faraday.

"We can't just let them throw knives at us. You're the adult, _you_ take the lead."

"We totally can, though. They've only got a limited number of knives, we can just wait for them to run out."

"And then they'll pull out their guns!"

"I doubt it. This is an attack of opportunity, they-"

Faraday made a strangled noise as a knife embedded in his side.

"Shit!"

Michael wasn't sure whether he, Faraday, or both of them had said that.

Faraday pulled the knife out and tried to staunch the bleeding, as Michael looked around for the gangster who'd flanked them.

Michael noticed Faraday gaping at his wound as it healed under his fingers out of the corner of his eye, but his focus was on evading the blades being thrown at him.

Despite being unbalanced pocket knives, they flew through the air with surprising grace.

There weren't any trick shots involving bouncing off objects, and they didn't move particularly quickly, but Michael still had trouble avoiding them.

He tried to evaluate his options, but his situation basically boiled down to being outnumbered and outgunned. Faraday would have his back, but it wasn't like he could deal an appreciable amount of damage anyways.

On the flipside, however, the other party was overspecialized in assassins while he and Faraday at least had a little synergy going on.

"Buff me!"

"With what?"

"Whatever!"

Faraday mumbled under his breath and Michael heard far off drumming.

He activated Wildcat Stance, and the world slowed down.

Not by much, but by enough.

He easily dodged the incoming knives as he burst towards the first gangster, flipping over an abandoned minivan to drop down on his target.

Even with Faraday increasing his mana regen enough to maintain the stance, at his level Michael didn't have much mana to spare, considering how he wouldn't be facing unsuspecting opponents like last time.

So he settled for a physical blow rather than using an ability.

The gangster was knocked off his feet and barrell rolled across the ground until he impacted against the curb with a thud.

Michael heard gasps and then cheering from the remaining bystanders.

He tried to capitalize, but almost immediately two other gangsters engaged him.

He turned his torso, barely avoiding being skewered by a six inch long serrated switchblade.

The gangsters had evidently decided that their strategy of bombarding him at range wasn't working, which was wise of them, but not great for Michael.

He turned off Wildcat Stance as he threw himself backwards.

The scratches on his side healed themselves, and he had a momentary respite from pain as both groups eyed each other warily from the edge of their respective engagement ranges.

He saw one of the gangsters shift slightly, while Faraday began mumbling another enchantment.

His mind blanked out from the pain.

His back felt like it was on fire, and he fell to his knees.

His health bar had changed from green to the barest sliver of red in the span of the moment. He noticed the regeneration rate was higher than normal, and realized that if Faraday hadn't predicted what would happen and switched to a healing spell, he'd most likely be dead.

Not temporarily, but permanently.

He stumbled back to his feet, mentally berating himself for forgetting about the last gangster, to see Faraday trying to fend off all four gangsters at once.

His pistol was out and firing, but he obviously had difficulty engaging four targets at once.

This was the last chance Michael would get.

Tiger Stance.

Time dilated, and he pushed off the ground.

~oOo~

A/N: Did you know that Lenessia is only fifteen (well, sixteen, here)? That makes Krusty/Lenessia only marginally less skeevy than Shiroe/Minori.


	15. Chapter 15

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 15**

~oOo~

Michael had quickly realized his quantities of mana were what could be charitably described as "pitiful." On top of his low level, monks in general didn't have much in the way of it. It didn't help that the primary role of his class was to spam low-cooldown skills in quick succession, which burned through mana at a frankly incredible rate.

He had also realized, however, that there was nothing to prevent him from cancelling a Stance once he was already in midair to halt its mana drain, while still reaping the benefits of the higher momentum he could attain with the increased physical capabilities.

The downside to doing so was that the cooldowns were applied from initial skill usage, so he would be cut off from using the Stance for a while.

But unlike the original Elder Tale, damage wasn't merely a function of the skills being used on impact, but also of the actual impact itself. Maybe at higher levels there would be magical effects assisting his damage dealing, but at this point the impact of flesh on flesh was more than enough to send his opponent's hurtling backwards.

He grimaced as he jostled his now-injured hand by jumping back from the gangsters, dragging Faraday along with him.

One gangster lay on the ground, cursing. The other three were still easily capable of fighting, but he'd accomplished his goal of distracting them from Faraday.

His position, however, was still extremely precarious. With low health and low mana, he didn't exactly have a whole lot of options.

Had he been an action hero, he'd have goaded them into chasing him with a few well placed insults, then stalled for time until the cavalry arrived, preferably in an attack helicopter.

But while it was tempting to just hope they were the dumb gangbangers they looked like, ineffective insults would just end with him and Faraday dead, and he didn't want to risk that. Plus, the 'attack helicopter' part of the plan was right out.

Another temporary lull happened in the battle, as the four gangsters conferred, then split into two groups and tried to maneuver around Michael and Faraday.

Faraday scrambled to his feet. He glanced apologetically at Michael, and immediately returned to casting buffing spells.

Both moved backwards, trying to avoid getting encircled. Michael took the opportunity to think through his next move.

What did his opponents have over him?

Ranged weapons and more numbers.

What did he have over his opponents?

A healer at his back and evasion skills.

He knew that, given enough time, the battle would turn in his favor. As an evasion tank, he could theoretically avoid blows while steadily dishing out hits and simultaneously getting healed by Faraday. Removing even one gangster from the equation would significantly shift the situation in his favor.

But his main problem wasn't anything personal that he could solve, it was that any plan he made would have to rely on Faraday staying alive to heal him. And no matter how well he fought, everyone here was still equal at level one. Should all four gangsters decide to dogpile Faraday, there wouldn't be much Michael could do to stop them.

All of them attacking Faraday at once was the smart option, of course- they hadn't seen Faraday take the offensive, and so that he couldn't hold his own in a fight would be the logical conclusion to draw. But it wasn't exactly correct- despite his rear-echelon class, Faraday was still an FBI agent.

These gangsters wouldn't know that. This had almost certainly been an attack of opportunity after someone had spotted him and his green hoodie at some point during the hours they'd been stuck in traffic, so perhaps Michael could use that to his advantage.

That wouldn't stop them from taking down Faraday if all four rushed him, though. FBI agent or not, he wasn't invincible. Michael needed more time to think this through, but he wouldn't get it if they successfully flanked him.

Perhaps, though, by reminding them of one of their strengths, he could manipulate their actions enough to at least buy some time. In the worst case scenario, they'd do what they were already planning, but at a more predictable time.

"Fucking cowards! Can't even take me in a straight fight!" Michael yelled, cupping his hands around his mouth.

The gangsters jeered- they wouldn't be falling for the 'honorable fight' gambit. Instead, they went in the diametrically opposite direction, and returned to bombarding Michael and Faraday with throwing knives.

This might have been a good choice against a party without a healer, or even a party with a more traditional tank. But instead of slowly wearing Michael and Faraday down, the thrown knives only allowed them more time to recuperate as Michael dodged them and Faraday finally figured out how to use his Ghost Walk skill to create a duplicate to absorb damage.

Michael's mana was still low, but his health situation was now manageable.

And, he realized, the gangsters had solved his problem with being outnumbered for him.

In trying to outmaneuver Michael and Faraday, they'd made the cardinal sin of Splitting Up the Party.

Michael looked at Faraday, then very meaningly looked towards the group of two gangsters almost behind them.

Quietly, he said, "On 'go,' we beat them up."

Faraday gave a slight nod,

The gangsters stopped throwing weapons, as they realized the mistake they were making.

"Go!"

Michael activated Wildcat stance, and Faraday and him pounced onto the two surprised gangsters.

With his health currently less important than his mana, Michael disabled wildcat stance in midair and let inertia do the work. His target stumbled back, although the gangster didn't fall over. Michael's hand hurt like hell, but was quickly fixed by whatever magic tied his HP points to his life.

Faraday arrived slightly after Michael, and promptly taught the second gangster a lesson about close combat skills.

The other two gangsters didn't hesitate to come to the aid of their allies.

Activating Wildcat Stance, Phantom Step, and Tiger Echo Fist in quick succession, Michael sent shockwaves through the concrete, briefly staggering everyone else on the battlefield.

Faraday recovered faster than either gangster, and grabbed a knife off the ground.

He whipped it out, and held it over one of the downed gangster's necks.

"You're under arrest! Surrender or I'll kill your friend!"

The standing gangsters laughed mockingly, but stopped all the same. "So what, we'll just respawn! We're all immortals now, didn't you hear?"

An ugly look crossed Faraday's face. "Tell that to my coworker."

"What the hell do you mean by that?"

"He thought the secret to getting Adventurer powers involved respawning. He was wrong, and now his family grieves."

"You mean…" The gangsters stepped back, suddenly unsure.

That did kind of explain why someone would attack someone else in broad daylight with barely any provocation.

The gangster not pinned by Faraday tried to stealthily rise, but Michael Phantom Stepped to them and slammed them in the ground. He decided to add his own piece. "We're not even secondary characters. We're the NPCs. You don't have plot armor, and pretending you're special is the easiest way to get killed."

"So," Faraday added, "if you surrender now, with us knowing that you did this thinking there wouldn't be any permanent harm to either party, perhaps the justice system will be lenient. But if you don't-" and here, Faraday took a long, hard look at his knife, "there _will_ be bloodshed. Make your choice."

The standing gangsters shared a look, but then gave in.

Michael barely suppressed his post adrenaline crash jitters long enough for the gangsters to kneel in a line with their hands up.

~oOo~

If this situation had one saving grace, it was that Michael and Faraday had already been going to the FBI office in New York.

Without the desire for some modicum of secrecy, they were quickly escorted to their destination by two flashing cop cars.

"So, that 'accident' you mentioned, was that…?"

Faraday sighed. "To be honest, I fibbed a bit to scare those gangsters- he didn't actually die, but he's currently in a medically induced coma. We're hoping the damage isn't permanent, but it was still pretty nasty. I'd prefer not to talk about it."

Michael nodded. Aside from that, neither made much of an effort to chat during this car ride, lost in their own thoughts.

Michael felt much the same way, and himself kept silent.

Though Faraday did remember to mention that his parents had been informed about the situation beforehand. Evidently, the camera footage had been prerecorded, rather than streamed live, and his parents had been informed (and agreed to) him and them being brought in for questioning.

Michael was at least a little bit in shock about a federal agency not being pants-on-head retarded, but figured it had to happen eventually.

The FBI field office was quartered in a tall building covered in glass. The structure might have been impressive outside New York but here merely fit into the background.

Michael dimly recalled seeing it before, despite rarely having cause to go to the southern part of Long Island. Hadn't his family gone here to report his brother's disappearance, when the United States was still treating the Disappearance as a terrorist attack?

He didn't remember the experience very well, to be honest. It had been a long, long night.

Entering the building, Michael and Faraday were almost immediately accosted by reporters and Faraday's co-workers.

Faraday successfully fended them off, leading Michael up the stairs to the assistant director in charge of the field office.

Three chairs were pulled up, two of which were occupied by his parents.

His father cut off whatever he was saying to the assistant director when the door opened, standing up to embrace Michael. His mother did the same, and he found himself rather uncomfortably squished between his parents.

But after the day he just had, it was a good kind of uncomfortable.

On this floor, the late-day sunlight still shone through the windows, illuminating the rather bland decor.

Michael sat down when prompted by his parents, while Faraday stood behind them, by the doorway.

The assistant director faced Michael. The older man sighed. "Well, this has been all kinds of messed up. We'll need to get a full statement from you later, but I'll fill you in on what your parents and I were originally discussing."

Michael nodded.

"Have you been keeping abreast of events in Japan?

Michael replied in the affirmative.

"Then have you heard 'Krusty's' response to your actions? Or more specifically, about how he claimed to know your brother?"

"Yeah."

"Good. Here's the deal. As of right now, the Japanese have a massive advantage with regards to the interdimensional travel technology. Nearly all the people with access to it are Japanese citizens, and for the foreseeable future nearly everybody coming back will be Japanese. Got it?"

"Yes."

But with Krusty mentioning your brother, we know that there's at least one well-connected American with a shot of making it across. You're following me so far?"

"Uh-huh." Michael tried to not get annoyed at the assistant director constantly checking to see if he was paying attention.

"Well, here's the deal. We want an American Adventurer over here ASAP, if for no other reason to rub the noses of the Chinese and Russians in it. Still with me?'

"Mm-hmm."

"Before this… incident earlier today, the US government was going to offer you the chance to either just show up on on television to ask the Japanese to do what they could to get him back, or to fly you over to Japan so you could ask the Adventurers yourself. We figured going through non-diplomatic channels would be a bit more effective than just setting our ambassadors to the task. But now, it looks like you're being specifically targeted. We're not going to force you and your parents to chose one, or either of these options, but speaking as a father myself, I'd recommend you choose the second."

Michael saw his father nod slightly in the corner of the eye. His mother was biting her thumb, which Michael recognized as a nervous tick of hers.

Michael chewed over the options.

"When would we leave for Japan?" Michael made sure to emphasize the 'we.' He liked to think of himself as a relatively independent person, but he'd never traveled outside the US, and doing so without his parents was a little bit of a scary idea.

The assistant director shrugged. "I could have agents at your house picking up your stuff in twenty minutes, and spots on a 747 before the end of the night."

Jeez, that would be abrupt. But to be honest, Michael was already falling in love with the idea. He'd always wanted to travel, but had never even been outside of New England. Of course, the choice wasn't solely up to him, and he looked to his parents for guidance.

"I think we should go," said his dad.

The corner of his mother's lip tightened. Silence fell over the room as they waited for her reply. Slowly, she said, "I think… going would be better than staying."

Michael faced the assistant director and shrugged. "Then I guess we're going."

He nodded in reply.

~oOo~

A/N: You guys more than qualified for an interlude this time around, but unfortunately I got kind of swamped making cuts and changes to my backlog. Instead, I'm posting a deleted scene that would have gone in chapter 12 before I took off a week to re-do the first half of this arc. I thought it was unnecessarily dramatic, but it hopefully serves as an interesting "what if." It is, of course, noncanon, but much of the information provided is canon (at least relative to this story.) I'm also going to have to put this story on a one-week hiatus from updating, as I cut out the equivalent of an entire chapter, and need to build my backlog back up. Sorry :(

~oOo~

Noncanon Interlude: Krusty's first night back

~oOo~

Much of Krusty's life before the Catastrophe had been forgotten. He couldn't tell you who his best friend in high school was, or anything about the cat he'd owned as a child, or the details of his second semester in Harvard. (That, at least, might had been the alcohol.)

But his stepsister he remembered well. How she couldn't quite live up to his parents' expectations, but still struggled to stay afloat in the demanding private schools she was put in. How she always took the time to be relaxed around her little brother, despite her course load.

She had died in a car accident.

His mother had told him after the interview, an afterthought. After all, she wasn't really _her_ daughter, was she?

It had happened six months after the catastrophe. His first instinct had been to just brush it off; after all, she'd just respawn at the cathedral, no?

But things didn't work that way here.

In Akihabara, he'd have his friends and guildmates to support him, and his work to keep him motivated.

Here, the funeral had happened over a year ago. He had no time to grieve, and no sense of closure.

There was nothing he could do. No ploy to enact, no monster to kill, no quest to take. Just a creeping sense of existential dread and a sparsely decorated room.

One less link to this world.


	16. Chapter 16

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 16**

~oOo~

The four Akihabaran adventurers sat around a western-style coffee table. Krusty's house was spacious and well lit, but lacked any sort of homey charm.

"BologneseMaster, you're more or less good where you are. Do you have any objections to continuing to work at your twitch stream, and maybe taking talk show appearances as necessary?"

BologneseMaster replied in the negative.

"Minori will need to play the role of a courier, at least temporarily." Facing her, Krusty added, "I understand Shiroe has already calculated how many trips you'll be able to take between worlds per day?"

Minori nodded. "Tohya did the math, actually. The theoretical maximum available time for me is four hours, twelve minutes, but each trip I take here takes off eight minutes. Re-entering the world of Elder Tale doesn't take any time off. Taking into account the three second casting time, I could technically make about thirty one trips. Given that I probably want to stay on earth for at least two minutes each time, I'll likely be able to take at most about twenty trips per day, and probably closer to fifteen."

Krusty nodded. "Okay."

Shoryu agreed with the reasoning behind the other two's assignments, but wasn't quite comfortable with what he'd be doing.

"I'm just not sure that teaching people how to use magic and Elder Tale abilities is a good idea. I get that it helps reassure them after the genius attack, and that a lot of people are figuring this out on their own anyways. But teaching them ourselves puts us explicitly at fault. For now we can technically blame the prime minister for showing off, but we'd have to take responsibility for people getting hurt if I taught them to use magic. Unless there's something I'm missing, I think the better PR move would be to wait and let them figure out for themselves, just in case."

Krusty silently looked at Shoryu. He looked at Minori, who returned his gaze. Perplexed, Shoryu and BologneseMaster watched them. Krusty broke eye contact and sighed. "You're missing two things. The first is a prediction- that because monsters spawn near mana use, Earth will begin seeing monsters spawn soon. If that's true, I want as many people as possible trained to defend themselves. The second…" He looked again at Minori, who nodded.

"I found out about this extremely recently. It's been a closely kept secret for over a year, and Shiroe only gave me leave to tell you and BologneseMaster. To tell you that he can turn ordinary people into immortal adventurers, like us. Case in point, Rundelhaus Code. Aside from Log Horizon and those of us in this group, only the prime minister, and possibly a small number of his chosen advisors, know."

Shoryu blinked. Then, he blinked again. He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it when he realized he had nothing to say.

This was...

Well, magic was already a big deal. It would change how people lived and worked, how mankind understood science and itself. But, ultimately it was just another tool. As far as anyone could tell, however, adventurers were actually, literally, immortal.

Shoryu knew that he'd been somewhat inured to the weight of that realization; before the Catastrophe, he hadn't spent enough time thinking about his mortality to be significantly affected by his newfound lack of it. But the idea that he'd just keep living without end, unless he somehow got banned from the last cathedral he came into contact with and died, was both terrifying and thrilling.

So that anyone could theoretically become immortal was mindblowing. Science fiction had been ruminating about the Singularity in reference to self-aware computers for decades, but the outcome of this would be just as unpredictable.

"There is, of course, a drawback. Shiroe says he's bound primarily by the availability of phantasmal-class materials. Even if he gets a more reliable source, he can only make an extremely limited number of people immortal. And since there's really no fair way to decide which people get to become immortal, I can pretty confidently predict that'll be an absolute shit show one way or the other, and I'd prefer that as many people as possible could have the abilities to stand up to immortals, so ordinary people aren't marginalized and power doesn't concentrate into too few hands."

Krusty gestured with his right hand, searching for words. "Shiroe… he hopes he can find artifact or production class replacements for the Phantasmal Class materials, but with all the other work he needs to do research is going slowly. And even if he does, we still have the problem of manufacturing them. Most overskills can't be taught, and we have very few scribes high level enough to ape him anyways. Minori could quickly make the transition, but hasn't yet to keep Shiroe's plans secret. Aside from her, about one in a hundred people are scribes, so we have a bare handful of high level scribes in Akihabara."

"So," he said, "one way or another, we're going to be introducing a new source of inequality into earth. Perhaps for a good reason, but we need to make sure the populace at large can guard from the abuse of power by a select few."

BologneseMaster quoted something in English. Shoryu didn't quite understand. "What?"

BologneseMaster waved it off. "Spiderman reference."

Okay, then.

Shoryu hummed. "I'm not entirely comfortable with it, but I'll do my part of the plan, then."

Krusty opened his mouth, then closed it. He thought over his words for a few seconds, then said, "actually, Shoryu, I believe I have a higher priority task for you. We've more or less confirmed that Nureha is on earth. She's keeping a relatively low profile, but we can at least guarantee she's here. I need you to track her down"

Shoryu blinked. At least this was more his speed, even though he lacked the Tracker subclass. "You got it."

~oOo~

Tracking someone who could change their appearance at will had proven to be exactly as difficult as Shoryu had thought it would be. It's wasn't that nobody had claimed to see her. It was that everybody had claimed to see her. Had he chosen to hare off after each and every 'lead' (and he used that term loosely) he'd have to scour the entirely of Tokyo.

The Plant Hwyaden website, which she was using as her exclusive point of contact (likely to get attention for the guild) had plenty of pictures and even a few videos taken by her, but she had been circumspect in taking them in featureless, if not necessarily poorly lit, places.

But as it turned out, these pictures had all the information Shoryu needed.

Pictures, when taken, had a variety of metadata stored by the camera, such as the camera name, aperture size, and the date they were taken.

Shoryu wasn't a computer wiz, but he'd spent enough time messing with Elder Tale screenshots to know his way around the "properties" screen.

And while most popular websites stripped metadata from images for privacy reasons, the Plant Hwyaden website was built by amateurs, and it showed.

So while his original intent had been merely to compare the times the photos were taken in the hopes of sussing out Nureha's schedule, Shoryu found out something far more valuable- that among the metadata included in the photos were her GPS coordinates.

The rest was only too easy.

He knew the phone she was using, and he knew the general route she had taken over the last two days. He couldn't fathom why she was hiking to Mount Fuji at walking pace, but he didn't need to.

It took three buses and some hurried explaining to his parents to get to his destination. From there, under the guise of playing an augmented reality game, he kept a watch out for a woman with a specific windows phone. The first category was broad, but the second, at least, was thankfully not.

~oOo~

"You've been wandering across this park for the past hour. I can't help but wonder what you're doing."

Shoryu looked up from his phone to find a blond woman looking curiously at him.

A small dog nipped at her heels, and Shoryu found himself once again annoyed at how short he'd made his character. Maybe she was actually his height, but with her hat she had a few inches on him.

"I'm playing one of those mobile augmented reality games-"

Shoryu took in more of the woman out of the corner of his eyes, trying not to seem like he was ogling her. She wore a long dress, and had an over the shoulder bag rather than a purse.

"You know, the ones where you-"

Her left hand held a phone.

The last post made by Nureha had happened a little under three minutes ago, it was why Shoryu had been distracted enough looking at his phone for the woman to sneak up on him in the first place.

"-use the GPS on your phone to-"

A phone, a bag.

 _Dazaneg's magic bag._

Dropping the cheap, prepaid smartphone, Shoryu sprang backwards.

Backflipping over his outstretched hands for extra space, he placed himself outside of the maximum range for Astral Hypnos.

His feet skidded across the grass as he crouched for better balance.

Nothing happened.

For a moment, he thought he'd just made an incredibly embarrassing overreaction.

Then, the woman laughed. Her face flickered in a way that almost reminded him of his computer monitor the last time he'd had a graphics card crap out, squares of light appearing and disappearing. Her hair went from blond to black in chunks and her clothing changed design.

"Ahh, I suppose this disguise has long since stopped being convincing anyways. So, were you looking for me for any particular reason, or did you just want a chat?"

Being honest, Shoryu was rather stumped. He'd focused so much on finding her he hadn't really considered what he'd do. A dog who'd caught a semi truck, so to speak.

"No? Then, are you here to fight me, the evil seductress of Plant Hwyaden? The Chosen Hero to the Demon Queen, to convert me to the side of light?"

Shoryu popped out his ears and tail in response.

"With your penis?"

What.

"But I'm sure an attractive man like yourself has plenty of girlfriends. I can tell you take good care of your tail."

Well, he did, but- What in the world was he thinking!? Shoryu let got of his tail, which he'd inadvertently grabbed. He blushed furiously, his mind going in directions he'd rather not.

"But maybe you're just here for a fight. And I wouldn't object, were you to ask for one. I find myself rather interested in how I stack up to Akihabaran adventurers."

Despite being flustered, Shoryu's first instinct was still to refuse. People didn't start duels unless they were confident about winning, or wouldn't be adversely affected by losing. Given that Nureha being sent to the Cathedral would set back Plant Hwyaden's plans, it was likely the former.

But in that case, he already knew why Nureha was so confident- despite their reputation for being poor solo classes, Enchanters were an absolute terror one on one.

Why? Astral Hypnos. While they had the mana, Enchanters could trivially immobilize their opponents, while still having time to attack physically and cast other spells.

But Shoryu hadn't exactly been slacking these past years, and had come up with more than a few ways to deal with enchanters.

It maybe wasn't the smartest idea despite that, but the Round Table had wanted the measure of her capabilities for a while. And anyways, anything was better than the teasing.

"A duel it is, then."

With no further warning, Shoryu attacked, swords pointing towards Nureha. He opened his mouth, as if to call out an attack.

As soon as his feet made contact with the ground, he sprung backwards. His legs extended explosively as he kicked up a small cloud of dust.

Nureha's spell fizzled out, no appropriate targets in her range.

He repeated the maneuver again, Nureha wasting mana to no effect.

To be perfectly honest, Nureha wasn't as good a player as Shoryu had expected she would be. By staying right at the outer edge of her range, Shoryu could easily feint in, cause her to use Astral Hypnos, then pop right back out before the spell took hold and put him to sleep.

She was a competent player, sure, and Shoryu was impressed at her response time and knowledge of her own maximum range, but it was clear she hadn't done a lot of dueling after the Catastrophe. Fighting monsters was still much the same, but fighting another person, face to face, had completely changed.

Nureha was stuck on the idea that players behaved predictably, largely bound by the limitations of their abilities. Shoryu knew better.

So after baiting her a few more times, Shoryu put his plan into action.

He came into range, let her start casting Astral Hypnos, and then exited.

But this time, he tumbled gracelessly backwards instead of regaining his bearing.

Pretending to have been affected, he fell over and lay still, allowing Nureha to approach him.

This was the riskiest part of his plan. Should she decide to cast Astral Hypnos again, just to be sure, he would be stuck asleep until Nureha ran out of mana. With his vitality and the low offensive capability of the Enchanter class, he'd probably survive. Hopefully. Still, letting her equalize the playing field could be disastrous.

But if she fell for his gambit, he could blitz her, nullify an Astral Hypnos with Razor Edge, and finish her off while she suffered through a cooldown cycle.

Ten seconds. Nine seconds. Eight seconds.

Shoryu barely prevented himself from tensing up.

Seven Seconds. Six seconds.

Shoryu slowly exhaled.

Five seconds.

Nureha didn't act. Just as planned.

Shoryu inhaled. He would act at the nine second mark, when she was closest.

When he woke up, he found himself in Akihabara's cathedral.

~oOo~

A/N: I took the week off to address a few of the more common (constructive) criticisms I get: that I have too many characters to care about, that Michael isn't interesting enough for his dominant role in the plot, and that my writing was a rather interlude heavy. As such, I'm discontinuing end-chapter interludes to refrain from diluting my writing. You'll see two long interlude-only chapters at the end of this arc and as the epilogue to the story. Thanks for all the feedback, and as always, thanks you to my beta Mizu25!


	17. Chapter 17

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 17**

~oOo~

"Are you serious?!"

Shoryu tried to appease her with a grin, but Henrietta was having none of it.

"You, out of all the Swashbucklers in Akihabara, get chosen to represent the Akihabara Round Table in general and Crescent Moon in particular, and you get taken out by an Enchanter!?"

"Henrietta, you're being so mean to poor little Shoryu! He needs to be comforted, not yelled at!"

Marielle tried to reach past Henrietta, who'd cornered Shoryu, to hug him.

"No!" Henrietta pushed Marielle away.

Shoryu looked torn between reflexively agreeing with Marielle and cowering harder.

Minori barely stifled her giggling, and some of the Crescent Moon members were outright laughing.

Marielle might have the title of guild leader, but anyone who'd been in Crescent Moon knew Henrietta was the one to look out for.

Still muffling her laughter, Minori sidled out of the room, waving to her former guildmates. The shouting cut out once she closed the door to the guild hall's pocket dimension, but she could have sworn she heard echoes.

Having heard Shoryu's account from him personally, she made her out of the Guild Building and back to the Log Horizon guild house.

Merchants waved at her as they set up their stands and dead leaves crunched under her feet as Minori walked. Sunlight passed over the dilapidated buildings that made up Akihabara. Miinori found herself marvelling at how empty the city was.

More people lived here than ever, but the population was so spread out that in many of the city's districts only abandoned buildings kept her company.

Log Horizon's guild house didn't stand in one of these districts. While a ways away from the most heavily populated part of Akihabara, it had become the center of something of an administrative and financial district. An enterprising Lander had set up an actual bank, as opposed to the storage-only bank in the guild building. A moderately famous auction house, one of the newest structures in the city, took up almost a block by itself.

There was even startup insurance company, although Minori though they would have trouble finding things to insure when everyone was immortal anyways. Maybe they planned to sell their services to Landers?

She pushed open the door to find Akatsuki and Naotsugu playing a game of chess as Tetra cheered them on. Isuzu's faint singing and Tohya's less-than-faint drumming carried through the walls.

"Hey guys."

"Welcome back." Akatsuki smiled at her, as Naotsugu muttered something unintelligible at the board.

"Hi Minori!"

"Ghhk!"

Tetra had been right in front of her! How did that even happen?

Getting surprise-hugged from behind had never really gotten old. That wasn't a good thing.

Naotsugu swore vehemently that Tetra had an overskill she'd kept quiet about.

Tetra swore, just as vehemently, that she was secretly a pink party pony. They were still at something of an impasse.

"Where's Shiroe, by the way? I need to talk to him before I go."

Minori could have, or course, used telepathy, but there was something about face to face conversation that a voice in her head couldn't replicate.

And anyways, it tweaked Akatsuki's nose. Minori had more or less given up on getting Shiroe romantically interested, but that didn't mean she had to lose gracefully.

"He left fifteen minutes ago, heading towards Roderick's office. Had some burst of inspiration." Naotsugu answered her as he made his move.

"Darn, I'll just call him then."

Minori walked upstairs to the office. Nestled inside the densely packed space, she initiated the telepathic link. After a little bit, Shiroe answered.

"Minori?"

"Just checking in with you before I go. Evidently Shoryu's death was more or less his fault due to the wording Nureha used."

"Ahh, that's unfortunate. And of course, he only respawned late at night after we were all asleep, too… Well, there's nothing that can be done, I suppose."

Minori inhaled, as the conversation paused.

"Is there... anything you need me to do, today? The stuff I transported over has been doing pretty well on ebay."

"Not immediately, no. In the long term, we'll need to hire a lawyer to make us an LLC, but in the meantime I don't… actually wait. I don't have anything for you to do right now, but just in case, pick up one of the Adventurer Contracts and put it in your bag. Alright, see you later."

"Bye."

The telepathic link shut off, and Minori got up.

Browsing the shelves that surrounded the office, she grabbed a hollow brass bookstop.

Their secure storage place was actually a pretty novel bit of magical engineering- a small pouch with similar properties to a magic bag. The holding capacity wasn't very high, but it didn't need to be, as it was mainly to store a few small items Shiroe thought were prudent to have on hand, rather than in the guild bank.

Sure, it was a little less secure, but it wasn't like Adventurers were very prone to thievery-anything valuable tended to be either stored in the bank, or kept on one's person. Banditry was a problem, but not as much as it had once been.

Reaching into the pouch with her fingers, she gingerly pulled out a scroll. Minori put the scroll into her bag, and then set the brass doorstop back in its original location, but rotated one hundred and eighty degrees so Shiroe would know that she'd accessed it.

She walked back downstairs. Waving goodbye to her guildmates, she left the building.

The amount of foot traffic picked up as she walked to the city's main thoroughfare. Food stands sold their breakfast food at clearance prices, preparing for the lunch rush hours ahead. Shops, indoor and outdoor, saw heavy activity.

Leaving the city gates, Minori used her horse talisman. She fed Giraffe a carrot, before climbing on top of her.

"Please, wait!"

She watched curiously as a uniformly green Adventurer jumped from a roof onto the ground.

Being a kannabi was great, but honestly she was a little jealous of the more mobile classes who could do stuff like that. It just looked so fun!

"A letter to my brother. His name is Michael. Earlier, he came from the United States and made it to Japan." His voice had the stilted quality that the automatic translator imparted, and Minori had a little trouble deciphering what he said.

"Oh!" Minori realized who this was- one of Krusty's friends. "Sure, no problem! I was going to talk to him anyways."

He bowed. "I am thankful. Can you be an escort?"

Minori blinked, offended, before realizing the translator had screwed up. He was asking to escort her, not, well… "Sure, It's a little ways away though."

"It is not the problem."

"Then, thank you."

She pushed Giraffe to a steady trot, as the assassin (Leonardo, wasn't it?) sprang into the trees.

They made it to Minori's destination without incident, a small building on a rocky field.

Minori dismounted and dismissed her horse. Unlocking the building, she stepped inside.

She closed and locked the door behind her.

The interior was bare except for a fist-sized metal contraption and Minori's talisman, moved here in an effort to prevent monsters from spawning in Akihabara.

She pumped mana into the contraption, filling it until the runes on it glowed a soft blue. Leonardo had already disappeared, so Minori merely stood in place until it activated her talisman for her.

As always, she re-appeared in her house. Maybe it would have been more convenient to appear at Krusty's, but after two years apart from her parents she wasn't going to go right back to not interacting with them.

"Welcome back, Minori."

Her parents smiled warmly, three plates of toast and grapefruit on the table.

Minori kneeled across from her mother, her father to her left.

"Sorry! I already ate breakfast today. Everyone gets up a little earlier on the other side; we got into the habit back when the only decent sources of light were mages.

"Whoops, we keep forgetting." Her father chuckled, as he moved the toast from Minori's plate to his. The grapefruit went to her mother. "Well, I'm glad you're turning out to be a real go-getter. How's Tohya doing?"

"Good. Actually, he went up a level yesterday, which puts him two in front of me. I'm a little envious, to be honest."

The crunching of toast paused, as her mother and father traded looks.

"About that, you guys mostly fight monsters, right?"

"Yeah. Mostly."

"But it sounds like you fight humans too. When does that happen?"

Minori had to think about that for a little while. She didn't really participate in many player versus player fights, for the simple reason that she wasn't particularly well specced out for them. Tohya fought in duels occasionally, but they were usually pretty informal.

"Probably… about two months or so ago. We, that is, me, Tohya, Serara, Isuzu, and Rundelhaus, dueled a D.D.D party down to ten percent."

"Ten… percent?"

"Well, obviously we don't want to incur the experience penalty for no reason, so most duels go down to an agreed on percentage of a player's health, which is usually ten percent."

"So, adventurers don't just duel to the death at the slightest provocation?"

"No, why would you think that?"

Her dad idly peeled the crust off his toast. "We got called by Shoryu's parents last night, who said he'd disappeared. There were rumors that he'd fought the mysterious Kitsune in charge of Plant Hwyaden. And as a result got, well…"

"Killed." Her mother fiddled with a spoon, rolling it between her thumb and index finger.

Minori rolled her eyes. "Yeah. Nureha- she's a fox tail by the way- killed him in a duel. I talked to him this morning about it, actually."

"She just- Killing him? Just like that? Why? What justification could she-!?"

Her mother's knuckles grew white as she held the spoon in her fist.

"We don't really know. Nureha's kind of erratic. Though really, we were all pretty disappointed with Shoryu for losing."

"Disappointed? With him? He just died!"

Minori shrugged. "Everyone dies. Some more often than others. And anyways, Nureha was an enchanter. He really should have been able to handle her." She looked curiously at her parents, both of whom had set their food down.

Softly, her mother said, "you don't think you're being a little harsh on him?"

Minori shrugged. "He kind of brought it on himself. Nureha probably cheated somehow, but he really should have noticed. So now we're down one person that could be helping out."

"That's remarkably callous of you," she replied.

Minori's mouth opened, but sound didn't come out. Out of the responses she'd expected, that hadn't been one of them.

"Immortality is a huge gift, Minori. Don't treat it like a toy. Don't treat it like you're entitled to it, or like it's valueless. I'm thrilled we won't outlive you, but at the same time, you can't let yourself become someone who doesn't care about the misfortune of others."

Minori's head bowed, her lips set into a line. She knew her mom was right. She had known all along, really. But it had been too painful to think about the lives lost on earth every minute. Or the lives that wouldn't be saved, if Shiroe couldn't refine his contract.

Her mother sighed, then reached over, embracing Minori.

"Don't stop being the sweet, kind girl you've always been just because of the experiences you've had in Elder Tale. It's fine to be changed by them, but make sure it's for the better."

"Sorry, mom," Minori mumbled.

Her mother disengaged from her hug, and her father removed the hand he'd placed onto her back.

"Though I have to ask, because nobody filmed it and honestly I'm a little curious, how did Shoryu lose, anyways?" Her dad's tone had returned to its regular unforced joviality.

"Well, he's not quite sure, because he was asleep for it, but it sounded like Nureha just got off an Astral Hypnos- that's a spell that-"

"-makes an opponent go to sleep for ten seconds after a five second cooldown, yeah. I've been reading some of Elder Tale wiki."

Minori blinked, a little surprised. She'd never taught her parents the ability to use magic, as it was something they'd never asked about. Still it was probably be prudent to show off at least a little bit more.

"That's basically it, yeah. So long story short, he went to sleep and woke up in the cathedral. We're not really sure how Nureha, an Enchanter, did enough damage on him to do that, but she did, and that's what really matters."

Matters, matters, there was something she needed to take care of… Oh!

"By the way, I received another letter to deliver." Minori fished out Leonardo's letter. "Could you please add it to the rest of stuff we need to buy postage stamps for?

"Not a problem." Her dad lifted himself up and grabbed the letter. Bringing it to a repurposed shoe stand, he unceremoniously dropped it into one of the many filing cabinets.

"Is this Leonardo guy foreign? He sounds like it."

Minori nodded. "Yep. He's from New York. His brother is the one flying over here from the US; he'll get here around one or two days from now."

"Huh." Conversation petered out as Minori and her mother rose from the table to deliver food preparation to their original places.

Minori allowed her mind to wander a bit. She had to discuss Shoryu's mistake with Krusty, as well as how exactly they were going to handle the princess when her and her handmaiden Ellissa made the trip to earth today. BologneseMaster had also invited her to appear on his stream, although this was thankfully a much lower priority. None of these things were a big deal individually, but she have a lot of trouble cramming them down into her four allotted hours.

Still, she'd try her best to make it work. She was no stranger to working hard, and wouldn't stop now just when things to difficult.

~oOo~

A/N: if anyone else is interested in making an Adventurers-in-the-real-world story, here's a starting premise: if you die after being banned from your previous cathedral, you get shunted back to earth, but with your powers intact. Initially it's political dissidents and criminals, but then Plant Hwyaden makes their move, and a whole lot more people start coming through… (Bonus: this is an excellent setup for street-level heroes and villains.)


	18. Chapter 18

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 18**

~oOo~

"We, uh, had a little problem." The petite, rounded snout of the carbuncle moved unnaturally as KR remotely controlled the shin-high, fox-like summon.

"Hmmm?" Nureha's voice lilted, her face betraying no emotion beyond a passive amusement.

"We ran the portal talisman, but it…" KR's face scrunched up as he frowned. "...it didn't work. I think."

"Oh? Did it break?'

"We don't know. We used the required amount of magic, and it didn't explode or anything, but nothing happened."

That was… unfortunate.

The situation wasn't exactly dire, but at least in the short term it certainly ruined their plan to bring a Westlande noble to earth in order to counter Princess Lenissia's arrival.

So Nureha found herself doing something rather out of the ordinary, at least for her.

Planning.

She'd known of Shiroe's ability to turn Landers into Adventurers for over a year now, and even had general gist of how it worked. "Contract Art Ceremony," as Shiroe called it, was in the same overskill class as "Real Food Preparation" and "Magical Engineering." Any scribe could copy him, so long as they had the materials and insight.

Scribes were rare, however, and Shiroe was secretive. Without knowing the materials Shiroe had used for the contract, Plant Hwyaden couldn't replicate Shiroe's feat. And with the few scribes they had on hand, Plant Hwyaden could perform research and development quickly enough to prevent social unrest if the Westlande populace got wind of what the scribes were working on.

So until now, she'd kept the knowledge restricted to Plant Hwyaden's Ten Seats.

But the current situation could, perhaps, be used as leverage over Shiroe. The Round Table had so far followed a fairly simple strategy., by focusing public attention on how Adventurers were simply regular people who wanted to return to their families. It wasn't difficult to guess at their motivations. They obviously expected to improve their portal creation system, and from there planned to reunite the worlds as rapidly as possible. As such, Nureha could confidently predict they'd react immediately to anything that would distract from their narrative.

Like, say, the revelation they'd they'd kept literal immortality under wraps.

Ignoring that would be impossible for Krusty; he'd have to respond somehow. Hopefully, by pressuring Shiroe into revealing his secrets to other scribes to produce more of the contracts.

That wasn't a guarantee, however. She had two options, really. Perhaps if she waited, a better time to bait Shiroe would appear. Or perhaps she could reveal her information now, before any more screw ups had the chance to happen and put Plant Hwyaden on the back foot.

Of course, considering her naturally impulsive nature, it was really more like she only had one option to choose from.

All there remained to plan was how she'd present herself to the media.

~oOo~

As always, Nureha was incredibly thankful for the versatility of her power.

She would never understand how someone could be smart enough to design an overskill, and simultaneously dumb enough to make it exclusively suited for combat.

So with her ability to generate limited amounts of clothes out of thin air, she made KR a cute little purse to ride around in. Her magic bag she hid. She'd noticed Shoryu glancing at it (boys were never as sneaky as they thought they were), and without KR, she likely would have lost that fight. And that would have been something of an embarrassment, to say the least.

Shoryu had been surprisingly good at hiding his vital signs; he'd obviously had practice faking sleep against enchanters. Luckily, Nureha had never had any intention of playing fair, and a scout summon was far more capable than her at close observation.

She would have preferred to don her old blond-haired disguise, but didn't need any more interruptions. Instead, she decided to emulate a snooty french tourist, black-and-white striped shirt, beret, and all.

She didn't head to one of the many Japanese news stations headquartered in Tokyo, eschewing the glitzy skyscrapers she would have preferred.

Instead, she made her way to an unremarkable office in an unremarkable mid-rise building. Even the receptionist was unremarkable. Her lipstick and clothing were in dull restrained shades, and her mascara fell comfortably into what scientists would call the goldilocks zone were they discussing life-bearing planets. Enough to help her look attractive, but not enough to significantly change the features on her face.

The receptionist smiled somewhat wanly. They likely weren't used to unknown visitors. After all, reporters tended to be the ones doing the visiting.

"Hello, welcome to the Reuters Tokyo affiliate office. Do you have an appointment, or would you like me to schedule one?"

Nureha responded with a slight smile of her own. "I don't have an appointment, but I have a feeling I'll find myself in one anyways."

Nureha opened the flap of her purse, allowing KR to jump out.

The receptionist looked at him with mild curiosity.

Then, Nureha deactivated her overskill.

From extended experience analysing herself in the mirror, Nureha knew what the receptionist was seeing.

An eerie flicker to begin with. Then, parts of her would rapidly flash, not entirely unlike a DVD that had been scratched. Her features would freeze and stutter, switching rapidly between her true form and the form of her disguise.

Finally, the tails would appear.

At level ninety, they were an imposing sight. They swayed slightly as she shifted, constantly reorienting themselves.

The receptionist shut her mouth with an audible click.

Stuttering out something incoherent, she turned around and practically dashed out of the reception area, half-formed instructions to stay in place flung at Nureha.

Not that she listened, of course.

Stepping through the still-open door, she entered the main office.

The sound of fingers on keyboards petered out as the employees in the office peered over file cabinets and the short walls of their desks.

A man in a business suit stumbled out of an office, the receptionist trailing closely behind him.

Spotting Nureha, he all but jogged through the labyrinthine table arrangement, narrowly avoiding knocking over sheafs of paper and binders full of documents.

He reached out for a handshake, so of course Nureha made a quick curtsey.

Leaving others off balance was a specialty of hers. From the way she acted to her rather peculiar taste in creature comforts, she placed people, Adventurer or Lander, on their back foot as they interacted with her.

That let her set the pace and tone of the conversation, an all-important part of bringing an audience under her sway.

She made sure to start talking just as he did, and then immediately paused to apologize. The man, a little slower on the uptake, stumbled over his words before recovering.

"Hello, I am pleased to meet you. My name is Tobi- Togarashi. For what reason have you come here?"

"I apologize for arriving unannounced, but I'm here to schedule an interview."

"That's not a problem, not at all. When would your schedule be open?"

Nureha shrugged. "Oh, whenever you're ready for it, I suppose."

"Would, uh, now work?"

"I don't see why not."

As the manager apologized for not having the camera ready and offered her some tea, coffee, cold water, something, anything, Nureha smiled mysteriously and answered his preliminary questions in as vague a manner as possible to leave him guessing at her intentions.

Finally, a camera crew arrived.

While flustered, the manager remembered to ask her to sign a release document allowing her statements to be aired and reproduced.

Nureha was aware that this wasn't technically a requirement, but still took it as a welcome sign that the manager was deferring to her.

They walked out of the office, Nureha in front of the small group. Heads rubbernecked as she went by, and she made sure to add just a little bounce in her step just for the onlookers.

"Would you prefer to have this interview outside or inside?"

"Oh, here is fine."

"Good, good, uh... " The manager looked towards the camerawoman, who was fiddling with her machine, and the receptionist, who had a notepad and paper out. "Are you ready?"

The receptionist nodded, as the camerawoman said "wait a second, almost good."

The silence that followed was uncomfortable, but brief as the camerawoman fixed whatever had been wrong with the camera.

"Heh, it's been a long time since I was in front of the camera," the manager said. "Alright, starting in three, two…"

Nureha noticed that he looked more in his element, now that the interview had started.

The camerawoman gave a thumbs up, pointing the camera at the manager, who held a microphone up to his face.

"This is Reuters News, Tokyo affiliate. We've just been approached by the guild leader of Plant Hwyaden, who'd previously been completely avoiding contact with the media." He turned to Nureha. "Alright, question one. How long have you been on earth?"

"Oh, a few days." Terse and vague answers probably weren't what he was looking for, but Nureha still had to get more of a feel for the manager before responding in full. It wouldn't do to alienate him, of course, but she needed to position herself so he'd ask the questions she wanted him to ask.

"But you haven't contacted the media or your family? Why?"

That had been easier than she expected.

Nureha motioned to KR's summon.

"He can explain better than I."

The carbuncle cleared its throat, a high-pitched chirp becoming KR's tenor voice.

"Down here."

The camerawoman made a slight sound of surprise, but the manager managed to stay professional, even while he crouched down to hold the microphone to what could have been mistaken for a small dog.

"Hi, I'm KR, and what you're looking at is my summon. My real body is back on the other side, but I'm using a summoner ability to remotely control this fuzzy little carbuncle. I actually came through a bit before Nureha did- portal energy consumption is a factor of portal area, not circumference, which means it's much cheaper mana-wise to send a tiny little summon through than a person. It's kind of hard to take me seriously like this, though, so I just did some information gathering while waiting around for Nureha to come through."

KR stopped talking, and the camera panned back up to Nureha, obviously expecting her to complete the explanation.

So she did.

"The information he gathered is why I didn't immediately make direct contact. It wasn't something we wanted to reveal, and have it turn out to be just a false hope." Nureha's smile grew slightly wider as she paused. The anticipation on their faces was delicious. "The discovery of how to change ordinary people into Adventurers will be, to say the least, world changing."

"Are you referring to the ability for ordinary people to use magic?"

"That too, yes."

And there was the look of dawning comprehension she'd been waiting for.

"You mean, turning people into Adventurers, including the ability to respawn?"

"And in addition, the inability to age."

"What is it?"

Hook, line, and sinker.

"That's a somewhat more difficult question to answer. It's my understanding that Shiroe, guild leader of Log Horizon, is in possession of the method. He's chosen not to reveal how to do so, however."

"Why wouldn't he?"

Nureha placed a hand over her mouth, almost, but not quite preventing the camera from seeing her chew the side of her bottom lip. "Unfortunately... I don't know."

"Could you, maybe, speculate?"

"Ahh, I'm a little hesitant to do so. A number of my colleagues played alongside him in the Debauchery Tea Party, so I wouldn't want to accidentally slander him."

That she was slandering him by implication of course played right into Nureha's hands. She regretted doing so, of course; she truly admired Shiroe. But he had requested that she stay his enemy, and would do so to the best of her ability.

But her interviewer didn't seem to notice that, exactly as she intended.

Feigning hesitance, she said, "But… well, it may be possible that it's related to his overskill. It's well known that he can make magical contracts."

"Overskills are skills that are unique to a single person, right?"

"Correct." Nureha needed to buy some time to consider her options. "Actually, I have one of my own, if you'd like to see it."

"Of course!"

As she transformed into her Darrielle disguise, Nureha considered whether to talk about Shiroe's well known independance and dislike for being used, while at the same time implicating that he was stingy and misanthropic.

Ultimately, however, she settled on continuing with her original plan.

"That was very impressive. So you can't teach overskills to anyone else, and this 'Shiroe' hasn't spread the knowledge because he can't make everyone immortal?"

"Well, it would be more accurate to say that _most_ overskills can't be taught, although that doesn't apply to all of them. Like, for example, the overskills that allowed craftsmen and cooks to make new items in violation of the existing crafting system."

"If the overskill could be taught, why wouldn't Shiroe spread it?"

"I don't have a good answer for that. An extremely small number of players are high level scribes, so perhaps he didn't see the value in doing so."

And now she'd successfully imparted the implication of monopoly, that Shiroe was keeping the information to himself for personal profit.

"How did you find out?"

"To be honest, I had suspicions for quite a long time. Rundelhaus Code, a member of Log Horizon, is also rumored to be the son of a Ninetails Dominion military governor. But under regular conditions, people of the land aren't able to join guilds. Of course, that didn't confirm that he'd been made an adventurer, but it was certainly something that bore looking into."

Finally, evidence, to make her claim seem credible.

The rest of the interview would be uninteresting small talk in comparison to that revelation. Even her duel with the swashbuckler would get drowned out. But if her timing had been correct, Nureha would be neatly intercepting the attention that would have gone to princess Lenessia's arrival.

Nureha was impulsive, yes, but that was a far sight better than being like the Akihabara Round Table: predictable.

~oOo~

A/N: Aside from thanking my beta Mizu25, I'd also like to thank DQueenie13. S/he's spent a lot of time updating the wiki, which I've found an invaluable tool for making sure this fic still more-or-less adheres to canon.

And thus concludes arc 2. This fic will be taking a two week hiatus for me to sort out arc 3. I will be updating next week with an interlude chapter, however, so it's really more like a one-week hiatus.


	19. Chapter 19 - Interludes 2

A/N: An interlude-only chapter to tide you over until arc 3. Everything here is canon.

~oOo~

Log Horizon © Mamare Touno

This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978

Chapter 19

~oOo~

Interlude: a Tangential Perspective

~oOo~

Her husband had always been a late riser, but Chigusa considered herself to be something of an early bird.

Setting the soup to slowly simmer, she skillfully manipulated her cooking implements to make two, perfect, sunny side up eggs. The rice she reheated from yesterday, not seeing any reason to make her job harder.

Her husband stumbled out of the bedroom wearing a worn, green bathrobe. Yawning and bleary-eyed, he gently kneeled in front of the kotatsu, mumbling a greeting to her.

Chigusa chuckled a little under her breath, knowing he wouldn't be fully awake for another twenty minutes or so. He was so cute when he was like this, too! It brought her back the early days of their marriage, preparing breakfast for her hungover salaryman husband.

Of course, her nagging had finally had some effect, and he'd cut down on the drinking almost a decade back.

Now, they were retirees, content to enjoy their peaceful lives.

She gave him a quick peck on the cheek as she set down his portion, and he mumbled a quiet thank you under his breath.

If she hadn't been married to him for decades, it would be easy to draw the conclusion that he was a lazy layabout all the time.

Of course, she _had_ been married for all that time, and knew he'd be energetic and bright-eyed in time for his volunteer duties to the neighborhood library.

The hardest part of retiring was finding something to fill up all the newfound time, and her husband had chosen to give back the community they'd lived in.

Chigusa? She wrote.

Poetry, some well-researched (if she said so herself) historical fiction, and even (under an assumed name, of course) a rather niche piece of web fiction targeted towards the high-school demographic.

None of it had been traditionally published, but in her twilight years, she'd grown invested in leaving behind a body of work that would outlast her.

And in response to her chance meeting with the little girl turned transdimensional ambassador, she'd decided to try something a little different- a book concerning current events.

She'd been there from the very beginning. It was only fitting that she saw it through to the end.

Finishing up her breakfast, her husband still more-or-less insensate, she stood up. Bending over, she cleared their plates and cups from the table.

Though instead of immediately starting to wash them, she went back to the table and took out her phone.

Her son's weekly phone call happened today.

The phone started ringing seven thirty on the dot.

Chigusa didn't know where her son's punctuality came from (certainly not from her!) but appreciated it all the same.

"Hello, mother."

Chigusa smiled. Long since a man in his own right, but still a mama's boy. It warmed her heart.

A bit too formal, but not everyone was perfect.

"What's up, homeboy?"

She held the phone away and snickered, covering the receiver. She could visualize him cringing clear as day.

"More seriously, how are you doing? Is there anything you'd like to talk about?"

"Ahh, very well. I would regale you with tales of my activities, as is our regular practice, but much has happened in the past week that I wish to discuss, so it is somewhat difficult to choose merely one topic."

Translation: "I'm thinking." Chigusa snorted. She would have to take the lead, as usual.

"We've been good, too. I decided on a new topic to write about, and your father's been organizing an event for the library. Oh, and I met the most darling girl a few days ago, lost in the middle of the road. Things worked out, though, since she got reunited with her father."

"I see. I have had a productive week as well; quite recently, I represented my company at a trade show, wherein I cultivated potential business contacts. From a recreational perspective, I have completed reading 'Quicksand.'"

Chigusa rolled her eyes at her husband, who was marginally more awake with coffee in him. On one hand, she had always been glad that her son had inherited her (and her husband's) love for reading. But all the books he'd read about the warring states period in his youth had left an indelible mark on how he spoke.

"In addition, I would like to speak concerning the... 'Adventurer' situation. What are your opinions on it?"

"Well, obviously, I'm glad they'll be reunited with their families, even if it takes a while."

The phone went quiet except for the omnipresent background hiss as Chigusa waited for her son to elaborate on what was bothering him.

"... While I am of course in agreement with the notion that Adventurers reuniting with their families would be optimal, I must admit I have some concerns regarding their willingness to use violence."

"Oh?"

"On seeing the news coverage of their engagement with 'genius,' I was unpleasantly surprised at how much damage they did to the area. Shops will be closed for months as the roads and storefronts are repaired, but none of the Adventurers have stepped up to pay for the damage incurred, or even to apologize to those who owned the shops."

Letting just a little bit of frost into her voice, Chigusa replied. "They risked their lives to defend us against that monster. We don't ask firemen to pay for houses burned down by fire, even if they cause water damage to the property."

"I agree that they are justly lauded as heroes. However, they have repeatedly confirmed that they are now immortal. While, of course, they suffer penalties on death, it would be merely a matter of time for them to regain any lost abilities, so logically speaking their cost of dying could be calculated as the worth of their time multiplied by the time spent re-acquiring their skills. So perhaps they could have been at least a little more careful with their surroundings."

Chigusa frowned and briefly shook her head, despite knowing her son couldn't see her. She supposed cynicism was the logical end result of becoming an economist… But for her, whenever she thought of that sweet little girl she'd met dying, her stomach turned. The idea that she should die merely to prevent property damage felt like a punch in the gut, even if Chigusa knew that she'd be revived later.

In a reprimanding tone, she said, "That's a horrible way to think. If they hadn't taken care of that monster, who knows how many would have died? It was an emergency situation, and they had better things to focus on than not cracking a little bit of unimportant concrete."

Her son sighed. "I suppose you are right. We should speak of happier topics instead."

And so they did, but Chigusa knew that he was still harboring his concerns, and a stern talking-to wouldn't solve them. And she knew that other people, across the country and world, would have identical concerns.

Handing the phone to her husband, she felt uncharacteristically depressed at that, though. She dearly hoped fear wouldn't prevent the successful re-integration of the adventurers.

~oOo~

Interlude: Negotiations

~oOo~

Roe2 lounged across her plush, velvet covered seat. She spun idly, rotating perhaps a quarter turn each time before reversing direction. The room was dimly lit, with only the moon and stars providing illumination.

That had been a requirement of hers, one that Roderick had grudgingly allowed. Negotiations would go better if she was ill at ease, but at this point, Roe2 held all the cards, and thus dictated where and when they met.

Roderick's elbows sat on the table. In combination with his clasped hands and mirrored glasses, most of his facial features were obscured, a look tailored to be intimidating.

He didn't have a clue whether Roe2 was affected, but for all that she was a dimension hopping alien, she at least looked human. Well, humanoid. The fangs and pointed ears were something of a giveaway.

Roe2 dropped her hand from her ear, indicating her telepathic call was over.

"Sorry for the delay, I had to confirm some last-minute details with my compatriots."

Roderick nodded. "Shall we begin negotiations, then?"

"Of course. Now, I'll be blunt. I'm kind of fond of a few people, but humans in general, I don't really care about. I'm mostly concerned with my own species. But hey- we don't dislike you guys either, and I think we could work together pretty well."

Roderick smirked internally. She had a soft spot for humans and they both knew it.

"And 'working together' constitutes…?"

"Well, we have some technology you don't have, you have a population that dwarfs ours.."

"So you're saying that we have the labor, and you have the capital."

"Mmhm."

"And you're proposing a trade."

"Exactly."

"Of what?"

"Well, to begin with, we know you've been looking at ways to improve the efficiency of the portal generators."

Roe2 smiled, and Roderick felt the hairs on his arms rise. She didn't mean...?

"More specifically, you've been looking into how to create a power sink, to reclaim some of that energy bleed off you've had such problems with."

Shiroe had brought the idea up in a serious manner literally that day. How in the world had she found out? No, that wasn't important. Roderic focused his energies back on the negotiation process.

"And you could provide assistance with that?"

"That's a bit of a tough question, isn't it? Could we provide assistance? You've been pretty cagey with your information so far."

Dammit, he'd risen to her bait. It had been an educated guess, not something she'd known for sure. But if Roderick was correct, she'd inadvertently tipped her hand as well. She didn't want labor from this transaction, even though the human population was still of interest to her. There was a simple conclusion to draw then.

"We could provide information, but I'm not sure we could provide them the empathiom you'd ask in return for your help."

Roe2's face went blank. After a few seconds, however, her aloof expression cracked. She chuckled. "Heh. well played. I suppose we've both established what we want, then."

Roderick snorted, already feeling a little exhausted. All that tension, just to get the barest feeling for what the other side wanted.

"Indeed, we have. What sort of information are you willing to sell us?"

"Ah, well, this would be more of a collaborative effort. I'll give you a freebie, for your time."

That certainly piqued Roderick's interest.

"Mana is… well, to say "fascinating" is a bit of an understatement. It's the closest thing we've found to empathiom, without actually being empathiom. It seems to generate itself _ex nihilo_ and can create interdimensional rifts. But it's still not quite the same thing. We, that is, the Fools, would like to study it, but our infrastructure is a little inadequate."

Roderick considered her words. Roe2 wanted two things, fundamentally speaking. Information, and Empathiom. He could provide the first, but how could he provide the second?

"So, then, how about a little tit-for-tat? We'd both have the same goal, that is, finding out about mana. Simply collaborating on the project sounds fair."

Roe2 shook her head, smirking. "You lead a mercantile guild, Roderick. You know your economics. You need this information a lot more than we do."

Left unsaid was the implication that he was willing to pay through the nose for it.

Roe2 made direct eye contact. "So as such, I think I'll ask that you also provide us, let's say, forty slots to earth over the next three months."

Roderick flinched. "Forty slots? Are you crazy?"

Of course, he was acting. Practically the cardinal rule of negotiations was to ask for more than what you wanted. But by showing a visible response, opposing negotiators revised their estimate of how much someone was willing to pay. Well, opposing human negotiators, anyways. It wouldn't do to forget Roe2 wasn't.

"Four-zero. Forty, yes." Roe2's pushed her glasses up, her smile growing predatory. Roderick's spine tingled at the resemblance to Shiroe.

But, then again, it wouldn't do to forget Roe2 wasn't human.

Roderick snorted. "I'm calling your bluff. You need empathiom, and you need it badly. The more efficiently we can connect to earth, the faster you can get to earth and start collecting empathiom from there. Collaboration on the project would be more than enough payment for your information."

Roe2's smile changed into a look of chagrin, and then bemusement.

"Now, that's a little unfair. But I'll tell you what, I'll sweeten the pot." Roe2 took a breath, watching Roderick's reaction. "We know why overskills work the way they do, and we can predict how to make new ones."

Once again, Roderick's information was piqued. Still, he tried to keep his face passive.

"I don't believe you."

Roe2 had to know he was fishing for information, but now Roderick held the majority of the cards.

"Aww, you don't trust me? That's disappointing. But I suppose I can give you one more freebie, so listen up."

Roderick motioned with his hand. "Well, don't stand on ceremony."

Roe2 rolled her eyes. "In our travels, we've discovered a few fundamental laws of the cosmos. The ones relevant to this discussion are the laws of 'providence horizon' and 'contradiction' respectively. The first guarantees that two sapient species can't exist in a universe. The second enforces the first."

"But-"

"Yeah, yeah. Theldesia is a massive, glaring contradiction to the first law. And now, so is earth. But it looks like the law of contradiction is alive and kicking. The scale of geography changing? Male adventurers in female bodies growing girlier? Magic working on earth? All of these are because of the law of contradiction. It takes contradictions in how magic, or physics work between the two worlds, and resolves that contradiction."

"So, for example, the contradiction between food cooking with fire, and food only being created via a menu action?"

Roe2 nodded. "Exactly. And because we've been studying these laws for eons, us Fools have a pretty good idea of how they work in practice. So we can predict, to an extent, how an overskill will work, even without directly performing it."

"So you're proposing to trade that knowledge."

"Hah! You wish. You couldn't open enough portal spots for that deal to work. But we could maybe give you, say, consultation services on two overskills for twenty slots in the next three months."

"That's highway robbery! We could just test any conceivable overskill for cheaper than that, instead of relying on your fancy analytics…"

And so, with both sides having laid out what they were willing to trade, negotiations began in earnest.

~oOo~

Interlude: Plane Flight

~oOo~

There was a special sort of boredom native to extended, transcontinental flights. The anemic flow of chilled air from AC nozzles, the dull roar of the engines, and occasional flight attendant padding across the softly-glowing aisles contributed to a peculiar combination of stupor and nausea that kept Michael at the nausea inducing tipping point of being awake and going to sleep.

In retrospect, eating that airline pasta had been a bad idea.

And to think- he'd actually been excited at the idea of his first ever plane ride.

It had been fun for the first hour, sure: first class and a window seat was a pretty nice introduction to the wonderful world of aerodynamic sardine cans.

But now, with nothing but featureless ocean beneath him, Michael decided airplanes were a particular kind of hell designed for boys who misbehaved and got into fights with gangsters.

By now, he was so bored he willingly read the tepid, uninteresting writing the in-flight magazines held, targeted at jet-setting businessmen who traveled from continent to continent and the rich who took regular vacations to exotic locales.

He decided he didn't envy those poor bastards. This _sucked_. He closed the magazine, finally fed up with yet another article about expensive cuisine and how you hadn't really lived until you'd dropped three grand on obscure Italian wine to pair with your fair trade, no cruelty foie gras.

His laptop was available, fully charged and ready for use. But it was the principle of the thing that prevented Michael from grabbing it and turning it on. Going halfway across the world and doing the exact same thing he always did felt, at least a little bit, like a waste.

And practicing his monk abilities was out. It had taken the form of a politely-worded suggestion, but Michael had heard enough horror stories about anti-terrorism measures to bend over backward and accommodate the TSA official who asked him not to "use that goddarn adventurer hocus-pocus."

Instead, Michael tried people-watching. It wasn't a hobby he normally partook in, but when needs must…

His parents were asleep, sprawled out on the reclining chairs of first class.

The same held for much of the flight, and people in all directions were covered in the cheap, thin airline blankets. Michael had long since lost his in the folds of his chair and wasn't all too interested in contorting himself to find it again.

The glow of screens illuminated the majority of the passengers who remained awake. While the light was useful, Michael quickly grew tired of trying to judge their looks from the side profiles of their faces.

The lavatory flushed, a distinctive noise Michael could hear even from his seat. After a pause, the sliding door clanked open. Michael idly looked towards the person leaving it- a balding man with a t-shirt, a faded logo on its front.

He looked back to the screen embedded in the front of his chair, considering whether to turn it on. Then he did a double take.

It was a little difficult to make out with most of the aircraft's lights turned out, but the man clearly has an "Elder Tale" shirt on.

To Michael's surprise, he sat in the seat in front of and to the right of Michael's.

With the width of the first class chairs, it wasn't exactly a surprise that Michael hadn't noticed him, but he still found himself curious.

What Michael had learned about Elder Tale had come from dry spreadsheets and wiki pages. Long-dead forum conversations about outdated patches and the occasional youtube video. The opportunity to talk to a veteran of Elder Tale was tantalizing.

That didn't overcome Michael's natural reluctance to talk to some random stranger, especially on an airplane, of course. So he gave in and pulled out his laptop.

The airplane wifi was what could be considered "passable" this late in the night, so at least that was a plus. Streaming content was out of the question, so Michael pulled up an ebook to read.

A few chapters in, Michael noticed a greenish glow coming from the Elder Tale player's seat.

He was ready to dismiss it, but then remembered Faraday experimenting with a spell called "Bug's light."

It was a bit of an invasion of the man's privacy, but Michael leaned around to look through the gaps in the seat, curious.

The eerie green light came from the inside of a thin, brass ring. The talisman had five beads, each of which were attached to feathers. It sat on the man's palm, its circumference large enough to touch his thumb and index finger simultaneously, as the feathers lay limply off the sides of his hand.

Huh.

Despite Michael's public statement, magic was still fairly rare. Finding an appropriate object to use as the nucleus of choosing an occupation was surprisingly difficult, as they had to have some sort of history involved. It didn't make much sense, but not much about this entire situation did.

"How did you figure it out?"

The man started, the feathers of the talisman shaking. The spell went out. He enveloped the ring in his hand, as he turned around to face Michael. He had his mouth open, but didn't say anything, he closed it, pursing his lips and creasing his forehead.

Opening his mouth again, he said, "Wait, you're that superhero kid, right?"

Michael sucked in his lips, annoyed. He had done _one_ fight in a costume, and the media wanted to call him a superhero. It wasn't even really a costume! His brother had always been the cosplayer of the family, that stupid weeaboo.

"I guess, yeah."

"Huh." Let me just-" The man reoriented himself, unbuckling the seatbelt across his lap. Once situated, he said, "I'm Robert. Michael, right?"

"Yeah. You are, I mean, were an Elder Tale player, right?"

A wry smile appeared on Robert's face. "No, actually. Well, not really. I did QA for a few years, but to be honest I never really got into playing it."

"Wait, you were a developer for Elder Tale?"

"For a certain value of 'developer', I suppose."

"Didn't most of the company get caught up in the Disappearance?"

The man sighed and rubbed his eyes with his right hand, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose in the process. "Yeah. It was patch day, right? Elder Tale isn't like most games- we only make a major patch about once a year, so we tend to have something of a company-wide LAN party when it happens. They also conveniently tend to double as a way to start working on patch-day hotfixes."

"But you weren't present?"

"Well, I was, but you've gotta understand- when you do QA, playing the game you work on feels kind of like chore, to be honest. I knew a lot of guys in my department who still had fun despite that, but I mostly played single-player RTS games in my free time. So during the launch, I was out buying pizza for the office instead of playing." Robert chuckled. "I was pretty surprised, walking into the office to find nobody around and half-full Doritos bags everywhere. Thought they were playing some sort of weird practical joke on me."

"Huh." Michael chewed over that for a moment.

Robert took the chance to ask his own question. "By the way, what were you thinking, going out dressed like a Ninja Turtle to fight crime?"

Michael rolled his eyes. "Honestly, I wasn't. Not thinking, I mean, it wasn't that I was thinking, I mean- dammit, I'm getting tongue tied." Robert snorted, and Michael took a breath, trying to get rid of the fog sleepiness put over his thought processes. "I didn't go out 'dressing like a ninja turtle.' It's just that my hoodie is green, the first bandana I found was orange, and my name is Michael. My brother is the crazy one, what I did was just an accident."

"Suuure. And what about the crime fighting, then?"

"Also an accident. I was just running laps around my neighborhood, trying to earn a subclass, when I saw some dude getting mugged."

"So you intervened because you believe in truth, justice, and the American way?"

"Sure, why not." They shared a smile. "So what are you going to Japan for? Vacation?" Michael asked.

"Mostly, yeah. Though I'm also bringing across something for the Adventurers."

"Really? What?"

"Four three-ring binders with fairy ring transport data."

"Fairy rings? Those are for intercontinental transport, right? I heard that they're the reason my brother was on the Chinese server."

"Not _just_ intercontinental travel, but that's a big part, sure. So he _is_ your brother, then?"

"Yeah. I heard the Adventurers can't really use fairy rings because they can't predict their destinations. Are you planning to trade the information?"

"Nope, I'm just going to hand it off to them, or if necessary, get some Japanese official to do it for me."

"Really? You're not going to try and get something in return? I heard that they had transformation potions."

"That's flattering."

Michael's eyes widened. "Ah, shit, that came out wrong, I'm sorry!" Robert waved him off, laughing quietly. "I just mean, there's just- there are people who'd pay a lot of money for stuff from Elder Tale."

Robert shrugged. "Well, sure, but I think they need this stuff now rather than later, and trying to negotiate for it just wastes the limited time their ambassador can spend here."

"So you're just doing this out of, what, the goodness of your heart?"

"Ehh, I don't think I'm really a good enough person for that. I just feel kind of responsible for what happened, to be honest, maybe this'll make me feel better, or something. I don't know. Just gotta do what I can, right?"

~oOo~

Interlude: Raw Capitalism

~oOo~

"Wait, they make Dakimakuras of Soujiro? Why did nobody tell me!"

"Cuz ya didn't ask."

Fragrant Olive held her hands clasped together in front of her, a pleading expression on her face.

"Please, please, please tell me where I can get one!"

The green-haired elf practically bounced in place.

Behind her, Isami tried to pretend she wasn't listening, although the fact that she'd stopped practicing her Katas kind of gave her away.

And in her peripheral vision, Nazuna could see that Sara had stopped sweeping. So it looked like Soujirou's charm had gotten to her too, huh? Though Nazuna had to wonder who had taught her what a dakimakura was. Or more accurately, Nazuna had to wonder why Kurinon had thought she could get away with corrupting the poor maid.

Nazuna would have put Kurinon on her 'to-discipline' list, but Kurinon was always on there for some reason or another anyways.

She was good people, but the West Wind Brigade's solitary lesbian wholly deserved her reputation for troublemaking.

"Mmmh... Nah."

"But Nazu _naa~_!"

"Still no."

"I bet _you_ have one, why can't I? You're just abusing your power!"

She did and she was, Nazuna had to admit internally. Heck, why not just say it out loud?

"I do and and I am. Deal with it."

Fragrant Olive squawked in outrage, as Nazuna smirked.

"Just you wait, Nazuna, I'll overthrow your reign of terror and have Soujirou _all to myself!_ "

"Hey Isami!"

Isami flinched as Nazuna called her out, a slight blush on her face.

"Who would you support in a coup, me or Olive?"

The tip of Isami's sword lowered as she answered Nazuna.

"Um, Soujirou left you in charge, so you, I guess."

Nazuna held her palms up on each side of her face as she tilted her head. With her smug grin, if expressions could speak, hers would say "welp," popping the 'p' in as insouciant a manner as possible.

Fragrant Olive struck a pose, pointing her finger dramatically towards Nazuna.

"I'll get you one day, mark my words!"

Beating a hasty retreat, she almost ran into Dolce holding a plate of cookies.

Dolce watched Olive's retreating figure, before turning his attention to Nazuna.

"You know, dear, you really should cut down on the drinking. It makes you a bit, ah, tyrannical."

Nazuna pouted a little, scooting her sake bottle behind her back.

"Aw, just let me have this. I can't go on _any_ raids right now, while Soujirou has all the fun."

Dolce gave her a flat look.

"I get it, I get it. Heh, you're a real mother hen, you know that?"

Dolce smiled. "I try. Though, if I may make a suggestion," and here, Dolce leaned conspiratorially towards Nazuna, "have Michitaka ramp production of those pillows up. As soon as trade becomes feasible, we'll have a _lot_ of demand on our hands."

~oOo~

Interlude: A Nightmare

~oOo~

Nureha woke up.

She did her best not to wheeze, not to cry out.

She held one hand clenched over her chest, planting the other one firmly on the asphalt.

The dream was already fading.

Images of an empty, filthy, home, the backs of her uncaring classmates.

The usual.

By now, Nureha was inured to these dreams. Mostly, anyways.

She squashed her reflex to call Indicus. She always responded. She always knew what to say. She cared about what Nureha did, even if for maybe not-so-altruistic reasons.

But she couldn't talk to Nureha, and even KR wasn't inhabiting his summon right now.

So Nureha used her power to hide her baggy eyes. She set her phone on a tripod, and shooed KR's summon out of the way.

These videos drove traffic to Plant Hwyaden's website, and that in turn lead to more potential guildmates.

And maybe, just maybe, she could recruit enough people to fulfil her ultimate goal.

To never again be alone.

~oOo~

A/N: The "Law of Contradiction" and "Law of Providence Horizon" are canon, although I don't believe anime watchers got to learn about them. Everything else is fan speculation, though.


	20. Chapter 20

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 20**

~oOo~

Krusty had quite a bit of faith in his colleagues on the Round Table Alliance, that traitor Eins notwithstanding.

So he was fairly confident that eventually, the extremely low transfer rate of portal talismans would be solved by Roderick and the other mercantile guilds.

In the meantime, his goal was simple- to manipulate the political climate so integrating Adventurers back with their families would go smoothly. Past that, he didn't really care. He pretended to be concerned with the long-term stability of the social order, but that was just a smokescreen. He merely hoped things would fail to fall apart long enough for him to get back to the other side and running raids.

Politics were profoundly uninteresting to him unless they were the kind of politics that involved using his battle ax.

To accomplish that goal, however, he had a few obstacles he'd need to overcome. Among the most notable being public perception.

Shoryu's death had been a massive setback in that regard.

Nureha had done a fair bit of damage to her own reputation as well, as ultimately the world at large didn't care about guild politics. If she hadn't dropped the immortality bomb, every airwave would have been saturated with Shoryu's "murder."

Lenessia, at Krusty's request, had even brought pictures back to verify that Shoryu was fine. But Krusty had remembered, far too late, that Adventurers and regular people had considerably different views about death.

So on top of his subordinate getting killed on his orders, he also managed to look like an uncaring sociopath.

Not all was lost, though. In her haste to play her hand, Nureha had created enough of a distraction from his own missteps to allow salvaging of the situation.

Foremost on his to-do list was, therefore, sucking up to the Americans. Not that they could do anything for him directly, of course. In fact, it wouldn't particularly matter which foreign country he sucked up too. But Leonardo was the only foreigner he knew and trusted in Akihabara, so his least-risky option of getting international pressure on Japan to accept Adventurers back to earth in a timely manner would be to bring him over.

He had no plans to tell the Americans that, of course. His negotiation position was superior if they thought he was only talking to Michael out of a desire for something only the United States could supply, and maybe because he felt a little sorry for the kid. Portal trips were expensive to fund, and he fully intended to get something out of the arrangement.

Perhaps Kanami would have also worked, but as much as Krusty wanted to see her reunited with her family, she was, well... "volatile" would be a fitting adjective. As would "impulsive," "reckless," and a host of others that made her fun to be around, even as they also made her completely unsuited for the role of a diplomat.

Secondary to his plans were a few other image-modification projects of various importance, from the ordinary (making sure he was seen as a competent statesman, despite his age) to the less-so. (In hindsight, Misa made a much stronger candidate as an implied "lady friend," lacking the power imbalances between Raynesia and Krusty, such as his status as an adventurer, or the fact that Raynesia was under the age of majority.)

Krusty shifted in his computer chair, realizing that, despite all the circles his thoughts had spun in, he'd still failed to think up a proper response for the most important question facing him.

How to address the immortality issue.

Should he deny it wholesale?

No, Nureha and he had similar credibility, after the Shoryu fiasco.

Should he treat it like the secret it was, refusing to hand out all but the most basic of information?

No, the Streisand Effect would just spread the knowledge even further, and Nureha doubtlessly had some way of sussing out even the most classified of the secrets kept by the Akihabara Round Table. After all, this secret had been held by only five people, not counting Log Horizon, and she'd still gotten her hands on it.

There obviously wasn't any legal recourse he could pursue, and using the same rumor-spreading method of operations the Round Table had used to disseminate the information about losing memories on death wouldn't work in this scenario.

So then, his best remaining option was to go with the flow. In her haste not to lower her own standing, Nureha hadn't truly pressed her attack against Shiroe. Krusty could use that. People responded well to transparency; Shiroe wouldn't like it, but Krusty could simply reveal all the information he had on the contracts.

Nureha had already chosen to spread the information, so preventing social unrest was a lost cause. With information on how Adventurer Contracts were made, Plant Hwyaden would make their own. But that would just play into his hands- it wasn't like the Round Table hadn't acquired its own spies, and any research and development Plant Hwyaden did would end up back on Shiroe's desk.

And if they did manage to make their own contracts before Shiroe figured out how to start mass producing them…

Well, it wasn't like immortality was a bad thing.

And it wasn't particularly likely, either: Akihabara's bureaucracy lead to a much higher proportion of experienced scribes.

Though even Krusty, with his relative disinterest in policy, couldn't help but wonder what would happen if these contracts could be churned out like regular paper.

To live in interesting times…

~oOo~

Minori's arrival had dominated every single medium. Speculation on television networks, radio programs devoted to new developments, forum threads spanning thousands of posts. Podcasts, videos, blogs, and even businesses created overnight in a massive, knee-jerk reaction.

He'd received less attention in comparison, but combined with the aftermath of the genius attack, had still managed to be internationally newsworthy.

With a simple regression analysis, and the knowledge that a hostage situation in Italy was dividing media attention, he'd expected Lenessia's arrival to receive less attention still.

Krusty had been so, so wrong.

He should have seen it coming, to be honest. Lenessia had been trained from infancy to be charismatic.

Not that that made her complete and total disillusionment with politics any less funny, of course.

Lenessia groaned softly as she flopped backward onto one of the couches in her suite. Elissa stayed standing, not quite serene as a small, amused smile flashed across her face.

Krusty merely watched her for a few minutes, elbows on his knees and a fist under his chin.

Completely unconsciously, she'd managed to dupe the media. Her long pauses and serious, sorrowful gaze gave the impression that she was the rare breed of royalty actually concerned with the well-being of their people.

Krusty, of course, knew she just despised social events enough to daydream in the middle of a press conference, but he wasn't planning to disabuse the media of their already-formed notions.

"So. What do you think?"

Krusty deliberately left his question open-ended. In his experience, people would often fill in more information than strictly necessary if he just gave them the rope to hang themselves with. Well, that might have been a little hyperbolic, but the principle held.

Lenessia scrunched up her face, her actual "thinking" expression making her look less regal and more angry. Still cute as a button, of course, but she couldn't exactly help that.

"I like the air conditioning," she finally decided. Krusty snorted.

"Oh, really? That's all you've gotten out of this?"

Lenessia frowned. 'I also enjoyed how much more comfortable riding a car was than riding a horse or ordinary carriage, but Michitaka has already upgraded the suspension on mine."

Krusty chuckled. "No, that's fine. I just found it, well, typical of you."

"And what does that mean?"

Considering he didn't exactly want to deal with a pissy princess, it was probably best if he changed the subject.

"Nothing important. Actually, there was something I needed to discuss with you."

"Can it wait?"

"Something important I need to discuss with you."

Lenessia sighed, slumping further into the couch. By now, she had neatly ensconced herself between the overly-plush pink cushions. Perhaps she missed her poster bed?

"Then I suppose I must hear this."

"Nureha, the leader of Plant Hwyaden, did an interview earlier today coinciding with your arrival. Have you seen it?"

"No."

Well, he probably should have expected that.

Krusty steepled his hands.

"The important part was what she said towards the beginning of her interview. She'd discovered that we have, put simply, the ability to make anyone immortal Adventurers. And, of course, divulged it to an international news organization to spite us."

Lenessia blinked. "...Adventurers?"

Krusty explained the basics of Shiroe's contract, to his for once intent listener. Elissa,despite being an elf with an already-long lifespan, was similarly engrossed in his explanation.

"And you- I mean, Shiroe, didn't reveal this, why?

"Imagine all the crazy things Landers would do to be Adventurers. Now, multiply the number of people involved by one hundred."

Lenessia conceded the point.

"And you're telling me this because you plan to go public?

Krusty nodded. "Fear of the known is more manageable than fear of the unknown. Since we can't keep this a secret, our best option to nip Nureha's information in the bud is by making it obsolete."

"So was your intention merely to inform me, or did you have a greater reason?"

"The latter. Lenessia, I need to ask you a favor." Krusty leaned forward. Imperceptibly from a conscious standpoint, but on a subconscious level he'd be triggering a feeling of closeness, that he and Lenessia were conspirators.

"What?"

Krusty thought for a little while before answering. The general idea was to prevent the no-longer-secret monopoly on immortality from backfiring against the Akihabara Round Table via public opinion. The challenge was to do so without a canned response that made Lenessia look like a puppet.

"If you're interviewed about the immortality contract (and you will be), act as excited for it as you want, but in the meantime cite concerns about how they're relatively untested. Cast doubt on the safety of the procedure- after all, once Shiroe works out the kinks, it wouldn't be like anybody sane wouldn't jump at the chance of being immortal. But in the meantime, that should reduce the pressure on us."

"I understand," Lenessia replied. 'But in return, I have a favor to ask of you."

Krusty inclined his head but didn't quite nod.

'"Could you, um, show me how to use the this 'internet'?"

Krusty snorted. This was bound to be amusing.

"Of course."

Krusty considered activating a screen capture program for later hilarity but decided against using one as he grabbed a laptop from his magical bag.

"Now, I admit that I know little about the internet myself, but you have to understand one thing, first and foremost: It's a series of tubes, that carry information from place to place."

Krusty's understanding of the subject matter was, to say the least, rather lacking. Of course, his sister wasn't here to ridicule him, so he didn't particularly care. Making large, vacuous statements was an ideal way to deflect attention and think up a better idea. Because Elissa looked to be interested in the impromptu lesson as well, he even had something of an audience.

Maybe he could dump the social media duties on Elissa. She certainly had an eye for image, which would hopefully translate to an eye for images.

"Everything else just follows from that. I'll show you."

Lenessia nodded, and they began.

~oOo~

A/N: And I'm back with Arc 3. Many thanks to my beta, Mizu25, as always. By now, I've foreshadowed the endgame of this story enough that it should be possible to guess at. The first person to correctly identify both parts of it gets to request an interlude for the epilogue.


	21. Chapter 21

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 21**

~oOo~

"Before I heal her, can you made sure she doesn't have cancer?"

"Cancer?"

"It's just a simple healing spell- it causes HP to rise which then causes cell regeneration. That's great for fixing stab wounds, but not something you want to use on a tumor. For more complicated stuff, you need a cleric."

"Ah. Shi- um, crap. Just- uh, wait a second."

The nurse grabbed a wall-mounted phone and dialed in a number. Minori could tell she was new at the job. Her nervous tics- running her hand through her hair and tapping her foot- were things that went away with time. Or cigarettes. One or the other.

Minori suppressed uncomfortable memories about the aftermath of Tohya's accident.

The little girl's mother was looking rather spooked, so Minori tried to comfort her.

"It's probably not something to worry about, I just want to be absolutely sure, you know?"

"So, to make sure, you don't have some sort of magical sense that's telling you my daughter has cancer, right?"

"Oh, no, of course not."

"Oh." The woman's breath whooshed out of her. "That's a relief."

The little girl- Minori's estimate put her at eight or nine years old- whimpered. "Does that mean you can't heal me?"

"I don't know. I want to help, but if magic would make things worse I can't."

Minori tried her best to be reassuring, but either due to her lack of bedside manner or the girl's sprained ankle, wasn't successful.

The nurse sighed as she replaced the phone. "Unfortunately, we don't have the resources on-hand to screen your child, so it doesn't seem like we can authorize Minori to heal you."

The mother nodded, as her daughter made a dejected noise.

Minori bowed her head apologetically. "I'm sorry I couldn't help."

The mother shook her head. "No, that's fine. I'm just grateful that you were so concerned with her safety."

Minori left the room a little disappointed, but ultimately not unhappy. She'd been thinking about her mother's lecture, and taking unnecessary risks with someone else's health wouldn't be responsible of her.

"So, how'd it go?" Her dad greeted her.

Minori shook her head. She adjusted her ponytail, as she said, "The nurse decided it wouldn't be a good idea for me to use healing spells since they couldn't check for cancer."

"I see. Makes sense, I guess. This is just an urgent care clinic, not a fully-equipped hospital. Still, that's pretty disappointing."

They stood in silence for a little while.

Her dad spoke again. "Maybe a real emergency room would be a better environment? If the patient is dying anyways, then I doubt they'd care as much about the risk of cancer…"

Minori frowned. "I don't want to pressure people into receiving healing. The magic going even just a little bit wrong would lead to a lot of backlash."

Her dad grumbled a bit but had to agree. Minori knew he was disappointed his coworker's idea hadn't panned out, but it had been worth a shot.

A brief phone call to update the hospital director later, they left the building.

The gray of the parking lot and muddy brown of the nearby industrial buildings failed to improve Minori's mood.

Almost unconsciously, Minori jerked her staff out of her bag, brandishing it towards the carbuncle unexpectedly blocking her way.

"You!"

Her dad reached for his baton.

"Woah, woah, calm down!" The standard "I'm peaceful" hand gesture didn't quite work with the carbuncle's quadrupedal stance, but the almost disgusting cuteness of the summon made up for it.

Minori kept her staff pointing directly at the summon, not letting it waver.

"I'm not your enemy."

"Then why did you kill Shoryu?"

"Nureha killed Shoryu."

"She wouldn't have had the mana to kill him without him waking up, and duels are supposed to be one on one, the outcome was your fault."

The summon opened his mouth, closed it, then said, "touché. But I'm being serious here. Shiroe might have told you about me- my name is KR."

This time, Minori lowered her staff by the barest margin. "KR? Were you with the debauchery tea party?

The summon nodded, its foxlike head moving up and down smoothly. "Yep. A fair few of us were, to be honest."

"A lot of who were what?:

KR chuckled. "A fair few of us in Plant Hwyaden were in the debauchery tea party, I mean. Me, Kazuhiko, Indicus…"

Minori frowned. "Three is not a 'fair few.' And anyways, that's no reason for me to trust you."

KR performed what someone with a fair bit of imagination could call a shrug.

"Not alone it isn't, but think of it like this- If you consider Shiroe a good judge of character, and he played with us, obviously we can't be all bad. And anyways, I've kept you talking more than long enough for a sneak attack if that's what I was planning. Just hear me out, please."

Her frown stayed in place, but she agreed.

"So as I said, I'm not your enemy. I'm not exactly your friend, either, but we at least share a common goal. Namely, making sure Adventurers can reunite with their families. But there's a little problem with that on my end- Nureha does what Indicus tells her to, and Indicus's goals are a little more along the lines of 'world domination.'"

"Well, why are you helping her? You must be Indicus's only point of contact with this world, no?"

"Well, I _hope_ I'm Indicus's only point of contact, but knowing how paranoid she gets I'm not sure. And my real body's defenseless and guarded by soldiers loyal to her, so…"

"So if you can't do anything about the situation and help me, why are you even bothering to risk telling me?"

"Because I _can_ do something about the situation, but only once. Just wanted to give you a heads up, understand?"

Minori's frown grew more pronounced, but to her disappointment, she did understand. Yet another thing to be futilely unhappy about.

She nodded. "Fine, I get it."

A screen popped up in front of Minori.

"'KR' has sent you a friend request. Do you accept?"

"What? No!" Minori raised her staff again. "I'm not letting you track me!"

How could she have trusted KR even for a moment? He was just like Demagoguery. (Demon-ocracy?) Every member of Crescent Moon had taken Serara's tale to heart, and Minori wouldn't be fooled by a Plant Hwyaden member, of all people.

"Then how are you going to be able to contact me?"

"I won't, if I have to accept your friend request to do it."

"Fine. I'll be leaving, then. Can't have Nureha becoming suspicious." KR sighed. "See ya."

He bounded off.

Minori's father shook his head. "You were angrier at him for interfering in a duel than for killing your friend. Those are some messed up priorities."

~oOo~

"Political intrigue was not what I expected out of today," Minori's dad joked.

His phone repeated his words in the halting tones of the automatic translator.

To Minori, the content was identical, even though the delivery differed. A result of Elder Tale integrating the same translation software, she guessed.

The blonde, foreign woman chuckled as the translation completed. "A pleasure to meet you. My name is Theresa."

"I'm Michael."

The adults shook hands. Minori first tried to extend her hand for a handshake, to be met with a bow performed by the American boy, and then tried for a bow, to be met with an abortive handshake.

Luckily, they were able to salvage the exchange with a fist bump.

Greetings exchanged, all four sat down.

A red-and-white checkered tablecloth covered the square, western-style table. The room was well lit, but the gray ceiling, exposed piping, and dark, wood floors and walls gave it a moodier ambiance.

It wasn't what Minori would normally associate with the words "French restaurant," but since the American embassy was paying for it, she couldn't exactly complain.

Krusty had said something about not wanting to intimidate Michael when he changed his plans last minute. Minori might have cared more if she wasn't being bribed with expensive food.

The start of the conversation was tepid, as both sides stumbled through the ordinary icebreaker questions, but with the inconvenience of having to wait for machine translations.

Eventually, both sides adapted to the limitations of the machine translationsa and switched to using simpler, clearer syntax, avoiding idiomatic language.

As a consequence of the increased fluidity, by the time food had been ordered, both conversations had grown more personal.

Minori related a few adventures she'd had, while Michael satisfied her curiosity about how people had taken the disappearance.

It was funny- even though the experience she'd been through was objectively more fantastic, in the sense that it was a scenario literally taken out of fiction, its outcome had been predictable for the exact same reason. There were hundreds, if not thousands of novels about people trapped in video games, but not many about those left behind.

"The pope, caliph, and Dalai Lama decided the Disappearance was not a religious event. People decided that aliens caused it. Perhaps."

Michael made a variety of arcane gestures while he spoke, waving his hands around in tight, constrained circles.

"Space agencies were funded everywhere. It did not work. When technology failed, governments tried to legislate. They could not solve the problem, but in accounting for the possible consequences tried to reassure their citizens."

Minori nodded to show that she was still following him. He opened his mouth to keep talking, but then gave up, probably deciding that this wasn't a topic that could be efficiently explained with the verbal translator.

Instead, he started typing on his phone.

The translator couldn't use Michael's vocal inflection to glean contextual meaning, but by seeing the real-time translation of Michael's sentences he wrote as they were written, it easier for Minori to figure out what he meant by synthesizing the various possible interpretations for his words.

"Governments everywhere tried to make laws to solve the problem, though that didn't work for obvious reasons. Still, we're actually pretty prepared to deal with Adventurers coming home because of that. I got here to Japan so quickly because of a treaty that got passed a few months back."

Michael fumbled with the phone for a little while, erasing a typo.

"After a while, though, people got sort of fed up with politicians, which isn't exactly anything new, but this time around desperate families focused on the more fringe religions. That's probably why you got attacked, actually-the guy who stabbed you was a scientologist, so already pretty crazy and slash or desperate, and cults who've capitalized on the Disappearance said some pretty weird things about what would happen if/when you guys would come back.

"There's also a bunch of economic stuff," Michae added, "but most of it sort of flies over my head, to be honest."

Minori thought for a while, before tapping out her response. "Do you think I'll be attacked again, then?"

"Nah. Japan is pretty secular, it was mostly just the Scientologists here."

"Well, that's a relief."

Both were lost in their thoughts for a few minutes. Minori went through another glass of water, while Michael polished off his plate.

Michael resumed typing. A minute later, he was finished.

"I have to ask- is there any chance my brother can come back here? I know there must be tons of people on the other side that want to return home."

"Well, our plan is to bring everyone back who wants to. Eventually, anyways. But as for your brother specifically, I'm sorry, but I honestly don't know. It's up to the Round Table, and even Krusty only gets a single vote."

"Crap. Well, I suppose that's as much as I can expect." Michael's expression wasn't quite angry or disappointed, but Minori could see the tensing of his jaw as he clenched his teeth together. He sighed, relaxing a little. "To be honest, I guess it's a little bit of a relief. We were browbeating you guys into doing what we wanted just because the US government is on our side, but now there's no real reason to do that."

Minori… well, she had felt the diplomats were a little pushy. But how could she fault Michael for wanting his brother back? Being separated from Tohya for years was… not something she wanted to consider.

Maybe, if she'd had a different experience with Elder Tale, she might have treated this dinner as people just trying to use her to get what they wanted. But being a total noob was still fresh on her mind, more than two years later. She wouldn't be where she was, reunited with her family, if Shiroe hadn't decided to help her out.

"You shouldn't be sorry for wanting to meet with your brother, or asking for help; I didn't figure out everything myself either." Minori half-smiled, more than a little nostalgic. "You're here in Japan anyways, when I can spare some time maybe I can show you a few of the basics."


	22. Chapter 22

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 22**

~oOo~

Had it been required of her, Nureha would have been entirely capable of sneaking into the press conference.

But as it turned out, the news office she'd given an interview for had been entirely willing to hand her a press pass.

Go figure.

She arrived early. Not early enough to sit on the front row of chairs, but at least early enough to sit on the second. A Reuters reporter nodded at her from the front row as she took her seat.

The carpeted conference room had purple fabric over the walls, likely to absorb echoes.

In front of her, a pantsuit-wearing woman spoke softly into a voice recorder.

As for Nureha herself, she had merely donned the same "foreigner" disguise she'd used previously.

The room filled up quickly, to the point reporters and camera crews were lined across the sides and back of the room.

Krusty entered without preamble.

"I'm here to discuss immortality."

To Nureha's mild surprise, the room didn't erupt at his statement, even with a long pause afterwards.

Krusty chuckled.

"Well, to start things off, I was as surprised as anyone else when I first heard about it. Now, admittedly, I'd leart about it a bit earlier when I had my phone call with the prime minister, but the fact that making anyone an adventurer was possible was kind of mind blowing."

Nureha's mind went into 'political analysis' mode.

Krusty's first-order goals were fairly transparent- she could believe that he wanted nothing more than to bring Adventurers back home. But his second order goals were more opaque. Maybe he wanted his power distributed across dimensions. Maybe he merely wanted to stop worrying about so many people.

But in the end, understanding his second order goals was unnecessary. She only needed to know his first order goals to analyse his speech.

He was colloquial, to distract from the intimidating image he displayed even in the Round Table's formal blue uniform. He included himself in the same groups as the reporters and the invisible audience. He didn't use the term "regular people." All in all, he was taking a fair shot at seeming personable, hoping to sway his audience with charisma.

Implying that the prime minister had kept the information secret didn't quite match that image, but, if she recalled correctly, Krusty's mother was part of the opposition party.

"Now, I probably don't have to say this, but the process isn't easy. It is simple- it just tacks on an 'Adventurer' subclass to someone. But to do that, a guild entry contract is required. The explanation I got from Shiroe on how it all works is as follows."

Krusty paused to clear his throat.

"To enter a guild, someone has to be an Adventurer. So by signing a binding, magical, contract, the non-adventurer creates something of a logical incongruence. Now, what we've found is that the magic of Theldesia abhors incongruence- ever since the Catastrophe, it has been integrating the gameplay of Elder Tale and our reality more and more closely. So to solve the incongruence of a non-adventurer being in a guild, the non-adventurer is given an Adventurer subclass, which functions almost identically to being an Adventurer."

This was news to Nureha. She had known Rundelhaus had joined Log Horizon, and had even suspected his entry into the guild had been directly related to him becoming an Adventurer. But the actual mechanics of the change weren't something she had been aware of.

"Unfortunately, while we can exploit that incongruence, it also poses something of a problem. Theldesia's magic also resists new incongruences, and to overcome that resistance, powerful, high-quality items and magic are needed. More specifically, this specific contract requires Phantasmal class materials. That is the heart of the problem."

A pause for emphasis, allowing the reporters to scribble down their notes.

"For those of you who don't know, Phantasmal class items and materials are the rarest kind, obtainable only from killing exceptionally dangerous monsters. And when I say 'rarest,' I don't just mean that they're simply hard to find. I mean that they're hard-limited in the total number that will drop. Once all phantasmal materials of a type are used, that's it."

Nureha had been expecting something like that, but it was always gratifying to get her suspicions confirmed.

Krusty produced a small scroll. Well, small in his hands, anyways.

"For demonstration, this is a contract created by Shiroe and loaned to me by Minori. We've scanned the text and uploaded it online, in the hope that someone will find a more efficient way to make these contracts."

"There are quite a few other details, but they'll be related as I answer questions. Sir in the front row, yellow jacket?"

Krusty began calling on reporters, his uncharacteristically short speech finished.

Nureha considered her next move.

Her ultimate goal was… well to be honest, she didn't have one. She did things because, in the moment, she felt like it. Long term planning just wasn't her thing.

And really, that had turned out pretty well so far. She saw no real reason to break her streak of successes.

So it was more important to ask what she wanted.

Earth and Theldesia joined? She supposed so. She didn't really hold a large emotional attachment either way.

To please Indicus? Yes, to an extent. Indicus was, after all, one of the few people who truly cared for her. Who never abandoned her, no matter how useless she was.

But Indicus was a big girl, and if Nureha decided to ignore her orders for just a little bit, Indicus would be able to tough it out.

To tweak Krusty's nose? Hmmmm… Nah.

Maybe just a little bit…

Nah.

And now he was looking at her.

"Madam in the striped shirt?"

Her hand wasn't up, was it?

Ah, now she saw his play. He'd seen through her disguise (a logical deduction? Some technique she wasn't aware of?) and was preempting her actions by putting her on the spot.

It was a solid move, Nureha had to admit.

But here, again, her impulsiveness was helpful.

After all, none of her wants were mutually exclusive. She was entirely capable of going for all three.

"How does Akihabara avoid rebellion when only a fraction of its population is represented by the guilds of the Round Table Alliance?"

There was subdued murmuring at the sudden departure from the previous questions about Akihabara's scientific apparatus.

Nureha tried to work through Krusty's possible responses as he answered her, hoping that his need to speak for an audience give her enough time to prepare an effective follow up.

"The Round table is engineered to represent Akihabara's diverse populace by…"

Fantastic. Krusty had chosen the most obvious line of attack- the truth.

He continued speaking for a few minutes. Nureha paid careful attention to make sure he didn't unexpectedly deviate, but his response was ultimately unimpressive.

There was nothing inherently damning about it; the approach taken by the Round Table was a fairly decent compromise option, and the ingrained Japanese respect for order and authority made it all the more palatable.

But Nureha had been well prepared to handle his statement.

"Oh… okay then."

And that was it.

Krusty's mouth hung just slightly ajar, his eyebrows barely furrowed.

He waited a little while for her to elaborate, but moved on when she didn't.

She didn't have to pick apart his argument. Without that chance to contrast Akihabara's system to Minami's, the media and general populace would do the legwork for her.

Akihabara would come off as oligarchic (which it was, albeit not any more so than Minami), and the faint pallor of being part of the oppressive ruling class would hang over Krusty.

It was still hilarious, really, how Nureha had positioned _Plant Hwyaden_ to be the 'counterculture' option.

But as long as the masses of free-thinkers kept signing up on the Plant Hwyaden website she couldn't really complain.

And with this new knowledge of the contracts, those people were even more important.

Nureha had the suspicion that the escape clause for leaving the guild wasn't necessary. If her suspicions were correct, binding people bound to Plant Hwyaden on pain of losing their immortality would be, to say the least, incredibly convenient.

Convincing someone to permanently join a guild would doubtlessly be easier if they were already part of that guild.

But that was enough fantasising for now. Krusty thought her successfully disarmed. It would be such a shame if Nureha didn't take advantage of that.

But how?

Obviously, the hot-button topic would be immortality. How else could she twist the narrative to funnel people towards joining Plant Hwyaden?

Perhaps she could exploit the natural inclination towards tribalism. She'd already implied that Akihabara's ruling class was something of an old boy's club, even without mentioning the lack of female representation in the ranks of the guild leaders. Her next goal would be to imply that Akihabara's guilds themselves were elitist.

She couldn't do so herself, unfortunately. The conference room was packed, and even though Krusty's personal style of press conference left most of the time for question and answer, she wouldn't be able to attract his attention again without making a scene.

But she'd learnt that teamwork was the foundation of playing an MMO, and the foundation of teamwork was getting other people to do what she wanted.

On a small post-it note, she wrote her question.

"Unlike Minami, Akihabara divides power between multiple guilds. Assuming a way to mass-produce immortality granting contracts is found, could a minority of the guilds on the Alliance somehow prevent widespread dissemination of the contracts, due to, for example, a desire for exclusive entry requirements? We've been informed that Black Sword Knights and Silver Sword require levels of eighty and eighty five respectively for entry, and that the West Wind Brigade only accepts females into its ranks."

She had taken great care to not imply simple exceptionalism would allow entry- everyone believed they were exceptional. But those bars for entry had proven stringent enough for Adventurers, who had the luxury of respawning on death.

As for getting the question asked, she simply passed the note to the Reuter's reporter she was somewhat acquainted with. Simple quid pro quo would be enough.

It took another fifteen minutes for the reporter to get called on, but eventually Krusty addressed her.

Krusty thought for a few seconds before responding. "Individual guilds aren't prevented by the Round Table Alliance from levying entrance requirements, that is true. But the Alliance as a whole is designed to have guilds who represent the values of the largest possible number of players. Should someone be denied entrance to the smaller guilds, the larger guilds, such as mine, would still be happy to accept them."

Nureha had to admit, Krusty's answer was a solid rebuttal. Inwardly, though, she smiled at his small slip. 'Players' instead of 'people'? The Akihabarans had publicly been continuously callous to Shoryu's death. Not that she cared either, having killed him in the first place, but the more they seemed to treat the situation as a game, the more credibility they lost.

Whether this press conference would be a success remained to be seen, but Nureha had a good feeling about it.

As a reporter wearing a conspicuously yellow suit and hat was called on, Nureha tuned out the noise of the press conference in favour of daydreaming about what to write in her unfinished book.

…

Wait, what?

"... -from the Fairy King, and ink from the Time Dragon's eye. I believe there were other ingredients to the contract as well, but those are the relevant Phantasmal-class ones."

Had he just revealed exactly how to build the contract, with barely any prodding?

The reporters immediately moved on to another topic; fancy Elder Tale monsters meant nothing to them.

Nureha tried her hardest not to laugh out loud.

And to think, she had even respected Krusty! It was mind boggling, how he could have revealed information so important, so easily. What in the world had he been _thinking_?

...

What in the world _had_ he been thinking?

What did he stand to gain?

Obviously, he knew she was present, and he knew she had some way of communicating with Indicus. But he also knew that Shiroe had been stockpiling these specific materials for the better part of two years, and that Plant Hwyaden had an even larger shortage of experienced scribes than Akihabara.

So he was expecting innovation, that Plant Hwyaden would throw their resources into figuring out how to get a cheaper contract, one that hopefully obviated the need for Phantasmal class materials. And while the Round Table didn't place as much of a premium on spies, they certainly had enough to pick up on a large research and development project if they knew what to look for.

But that was the rub of things, wasn't it?

Indicus's project had been a completely new innovation, developed in nearly mind-boggling secrecy.

So while Shiroe thought of how to make a better contract, Indicus could simply manufacture them on an industrial scale.

Nureha's lips twitched, her demure smile threatening to turn into a maniacal grin.

~oOo~

A/N: Did some thinking about how Theldesia's schizophrenic magic system worked, and came up with this, as it explains transgender character voices (magic system resolves that by modifying voices), the whole cooking doesn't work-cooking works if you're a chef- you don't need a chef as long as you don't make fancy stuff transition (resolving the differences between cooking/crafting and real-world engineering), and the scale of Theldesia growing (probably had some physically impossible terrain.)


	23. Chapter 23

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 23**

~oOo~

Krusty had halfway expected a woman negotiator. It would have been fitting to see the same ploy he'd used with Minori turned against him.

But the American was male, slightly taller and rather less well muscled than him, by Krusty's best estimate.

Krusty walked into the room as the American stood up. A rectangular wooden table stood between them, and Krusty reached over the table for a handshake.

The chamber held all the charm of a hospital waiting room, complete with inoffensive abstract art and dull brown carpeting. Krusty found himself, once again, missing the unabashed ostentation of his own guild hall.

He concentrated, checking the man's virtual nametag.

"William Jones - Level 12."

Krusty was honestly rather amused with how generic his name was. The level was rather more impressive, though. If the pattern set by the soldiers and policemen he'd interacted withheld, 'William' was likely a combat veteran of some sort.

William started talking without prompting. "I know your name, you probably already know my name, so how about we skip the pleasantries and cut to the chase?"

William's Japanese was decent, but not incredible, so Krusty replied in English.

"Pleasantries are the lubricant that keeps society going smoothly, so I'd rather not." Allowing William to set the pace would be a poor decision, for all that Krusty would prefer efficiency.

William was slightly nonplussed by Krusty's statement but gamely replied. "My name is William Jones. Please take care of me." He followed this with a quick bow.

And now it was Krusty's turn to be nonplussed. Introducing himself like a generic anime transfer student? Gaijin were weird.

"My name is Kounoike Haruaki, although most simply call me 'Krusty.' I am likewise pleased to meet you." Krusty finished with a bow of his own.

As both sat down, Krusty said, "I must ask- how did you get to level twelve?" As an afterthought, he added, "and why did you assume I'd know your name?"

"For your first question, I was in the USMC and spent some time in Syria. As an advisor only, mind you. For the second, I played Elder Tale back in the day, and it's not like player nametags were pioneered by ET or anything."

That more or less fit with Krusty's expectations. And also explained why he'd gotten such an unprofessional negotiator, if they had prioritized getting a Log Horizon player rather than the best fit for the job.

When Krusty didn't immediately respond, William resumed talking. "So, our goals are actually pretty simple- there are American citizens stuck on Theldesia, and we want them all back. But that's not exactly feasible right now, so we'll settle for just Leonardo. What are you asking for in return?"

"You're really rushing into this, aren't you? I'm a little surprised; other Elder Tale players I've met have bombarded me with as many questions as they could."

Krusty was growing somewhat perplexed. A little aggressiveness would have been understandable, but the man had to be a trained negotiator. This was downright unprofessional.

"Well, if you insist. Uhh... Do monsters really drop loot when they're killed? If so, where does it come from? Actually, where do monsters come from? Do they breed, or something?"

Something was tickling at the back of Krusty's mind but hadn't quite made its way out of his subconscious.

"Yes, they really do drop items. Where those items come from is a mystery." Well, it wasn't, exactly, but... actually, Krusty realized William's game, now. He was fishing for information- deliberately creating an adversarial reaction, so Krusty would want to get sidetracked and talk about Theldesia. "As for where the monsters come from, it seems that high concentrations of mana cause them to spawn. That's part of why it's so costly for us to open portals- aside from the costs inherent in making them, we also need to secure a large area from attack."

Hopefully, that last sentence would nudge the discussion to negotiation, without overtly revealing that Krusty had caught onto William's ploy. Either the American would contest it, in a bid to minimize Krusty's bargaining position, or he would ignore it, revealing more about how much the Americans were willing to trade for the privilege of getting their citizen back.

Although Krusty had to reluctantly admit, even if only to himself, that William's willingness to antagonize him was his own fault. So far, he had almost fallen over himself to smooth over any wrinkles that would possibly interfere with getting Adventurers back to earth. Going so far as to reveal a state secret with minimum provocation, even. The Americans had (correctly) deduced that he wanted this deal to go through for his own reasons, and wouldn't have as strong a negotiating position because of that.

Revealing what he had might have been the optimal choice, but pressed as he was, it hadn't exactly been a good choice.

"And so places with lots of monsters get even more. That's where dungeons come from, I'd bet?"

William's voice broke Krusty away from his musing. It was a good sign, at least, that the Americans were obviously prioritising information. It seemed like he'd need to be a little more blatant, however, if he wanted to fulfill his original goal in coming here.

"Indeed. Which is a problem, obviously- the more mages we have in Akihabara, the less we have raiding and reducing monster numbers. So there's a pretty significant opportunity cost involved with paying mages to provide mana for the portals."

Perhaps sensing that his position was growing weaker, William stopped fishing for information.

"Which is a pity. Taking that into account, what do you think a fair price for transporting a person would look like?"

Krusty considered his options before answering. Generally speaking, holding the initiative was best. But finding out what one's opponent was willing to give up before they determined one's own negotiation range was a massive advantage.

He made his decision shortly, deciding that he'd set the stage enough.

"To begin with, we'll need financial compensation totalling four point four million dollars. That's just to cover our costs, of course." Krusty carefully examined William's face as he talked. So far, it remained blank. "We also want full access to the servers the American government seized from Atharva Incorporated, as soon as we can bring a programmer across. And until reintegration is complete, we want the Round Table Alliance to be recognized as the legal government of an independent nation by the United States, with _de jure_ territory comprised of the Adventurer cities Akihabara and Susukino. I understand that the United Nations has already passed a resolution recognizing Eastal."

William's face stayed blank, but Krusty could guess that the last request would be the hardest to sell to his superiors.

Almost as an afterthought, Krusty added, "Oh, and both the Akihabara Round Table and The League of Freedom Cities Eastal require top-level domain names; our preferences are '.rt' for the Round Table Alliance, and '.fce' for Eastal."

William's lip twitched as Krusty made his last demand. It was a trick Krusty had learned about called 'nibbling.' Asking for something unimportant to either serve as ablative armor for more important items, or simply maximizing the possible benefits of a deal for a minimal amount of risk.

William opened his mouth and started making his case, but a ringing noise distracted Krusty from the discussion.

"Please excuse me, I have to take this." Krusty placed a hand over his ear and assumed a thousand-yard stare.

William's mouth turned down slightly. Perhaps he thought Krusty was trying to pressure him?

But while there wasn't any indicator that the telepathic call was anything out of the ordinary, given that Minori and BologneseMaster knew what he was doing, the call couldn't be anything other than "urgent."

"Krusty?"

"BologneseMaster."

"We have a problem."

"Well?"

"It's a Genius."

Krusty rose suddenly, knocking his former seat backwards.

"Where?"

"That's… that's a little complicated."

Krusty started walking towards the door, a confused William following in his wake.

"Complicated how?"

"There's some sort of memory-erasing effect involved. I got notified on my stream by a bunch of Plant Hwyaden guildies; Nureha's trying to fight it, but as soon as it gets far enough away you start forgetting exact details. She's asked for help, evidently; doesn't think she can handle it on her own."

"Hold on a second."

Krusty took his hand off his ear and met William's eyes. "There's been another Genius attack. If your people can get the news out, please do so."

William didn't blanch, merely nodding as he processed the information. "Ongoing?"

"Yes, unfortunately. I'm still receiving details."

William hesitated briefly, but left the room, already pulling his phone out of his pocket.

"I'm back. Where do I need to go?"

"The Genius is somewhere in the vicinity of the Kitasenju subway station. Though we can't be sure, of course. Plant Hwyaden members have been flocking to the area, and they think it's more or less contained by the Arakawa River to each side, but also wouldn't know if it escaped. The only good news so far is that no bodies have been found… which is kind of terrifying, in and of itself."

Krusty grimaced. This was very quickly shaping up to be an emergency. That information about the Genius wasn't removed wholesale was the only saving grace this situation held.

Krusty garbed himself in his distinctive blue armor as he brusquely walked out of the meeting room.

Despite its padding and excellent state of maintenance, Krusty's armor clanged as he ran upstairs. Taking them three at a time, he made his way to the top of the building in short order.

The door to the roof was locked.

That didn't stop him, of course.

Pulling his gryphon talisman out of his inventory, Krusty summoned his gryphon with a long blast of the whistle.

It descended from just outside of Krusty's view, almost as if it had merely been hiding. Funny, that. Minori's idle curiosity had really lead to something astounding.

Krusty leapt over the gryphon's back, ensconcing himself snugly in the saddle.

In flagrant violation of physics, the gryphon flapped its wings once, lifting off from the building.

A second flap propelled it forward, as Krusty leaned into his saddle. Barely twenty seconds into his flight, he heard the distinctive thrum of rotors, as a helicopter took off from the embassy's helipad.

It quickly caught up to him, before slowing down to match his pace.

Rather than take a detour , the helicopter's path brought it directly over the imperial palace.

Deciding that he probably wouldn't get shot down for flying over restricted airspace, Krusty followed the helicopter's lead.

It slowed marginally, as it hung over the castle, but didn't stop.

Moments afterwards, another helicopter rose from the palace ground.

Another example of Americans being provocative to evoke a response, Krusty guessed. That was becoming something of a pattern.

The twenty-minute flight grated on Krusty's nerves, as did his own anticipation of the fight ahead. Still, he did his best to remain alert and ready for the oncoming action.

BologneseMaster had evidently chosen to take the subway to their destination and would be arriving at around the same time as Krusty. That would be useful for coordination, but Krusty's complete lack of foreknowledge worried him.

Krusty enjoyed combat, but the innocent lives at stake weighed heavily on his shoulders.

And with Minori still in Akihabara for the next hour or so, he'd have to cooperate with Nureha for any chance of winning against the Genius. Not something he looked forward to.

But despite that, as he dismounted from his gryphon, Krusty still had a confident grin on his face.

He slung his battle axe over his shoulder, a war-god striding before mere mortals.

Smoke billowed from a car wreck. BologneseMaster shouted unintelligibly across party chat. In the near distance, sirens wailed while gunshots echoed.

And in the escalating pandemonium, Krusty knew he was exactly where he belonged.


	24. Chapter 24

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 24**

~oOo~

Having confirmed she hadn't forgotten anything, Minor placed the film roll back in her magical bag. Transferring digital video would have been a lot easier, but CGI had gotten so good Krusty hadn't wanted accusations of doctoring the video.

Which was a little disconcerting. Yeah, CGI had been really good even before the catastrophe, but the rate of improvement in the past two years had been stunning.

Maybe technology had always been improving that fast. But even with the Merchant guilds, Minori had gotten used to a slower-paced life in Theldesia, where even on griffinback innovation took weeks to travel.

The room glowed blue, and Minori was transported back to earth.

Calling Krusty, she walked briskly out of her home. The sun was most of the way towards its zenith, making it easy to pick up on the differences in climate between Yamato and Japan. Trees here were greener, having shed only a few of their leaves. The air, slightly warmer.

"Hey, Krusty."

"Minori! I need you at-"

Krusty stopped talking for a moment.

"..."

"Krusty?"

"Minori? Huh, I don't even remember you calling."

"What? You just greeted me. Where were you going to say you needed me?"

"I don't-" Krusty paused, then uttered a mild oath. "There's been another Genius attack. It has some sort of memory-erasing ability; if you get too far away from it, you forget about it. It's still possible to record information about it, but whenever it starts taking too much damage, it removes itself from the fight." As an afterthought, Krusty added, "and we've tried keeping track of it by just constantly writing down where it is, but every time it gets out of range it's like walking into a new room and forgetting what we're doing."

Anticipating Minori's next question, Krusty said, "and make your way to Kitasenju station."

~oOo~

Even pushing her borrowed griffin to its limits, Minori's flight took close to forty minutes. Krusty provided her with a disjointed commentary, narration of the ongoing battle interspersed with blank silence as the Genius slipped out of range.

As Minori approached the station, Krusty's location became available at higher and higher resolutions, a general description turning into a street address turning into his latitude and longitude.

"Disengaging now, we'll have to hope the police can keep the Genius contained for the moment."

Krusty went silent.

Minori guided her gryphon down to street level. Rather than dismount, she had it skim above the asphalt. There wasn't any reason to conserve the griffon's ability to fly, as its time limit neatly matched her own.

The area was strangely quiet. Most windows were shuttered, although curious and scared faces alike peered through the clear plexiglass of a shopping center.

The overcast sky and the dirty gray of the buildings engendered a feeling of uneasiness that rested somewhere a little above her navel. It wasn't a gloomy place by any means, but the lack of life on the streets and the knowledge that she was being watched made Minori uncomfortable.

She banked, passing under an overpass. Turning her head to the right, the station left her field of view. Her path opened up briefly as she passed over the metro tracks, until she took a right turn into a maze of mid-rise buildings

Krusty's griffon braked, its wings flaring out.

Finally in range of each other, Minori accepted Krusty's party invite.

Reflexively, she pulled up an array of status screens. Krusty and BologneseMaster were present, as she'd expected, but an additional six people she didn't recognize also had their HP, MP, and names laid out in front of her, as part of a separate party.

"Who're the other people in the raid?"

"Two helicopter crews. They're scouting for us, but neither of them are armed."

An accented voice spoke over raid chat. "Shorakudo hospital."

"Where near Shorakudo hospital?"

"Shorakudo hospital." Krusty growled as the speaker repeated herself, but nevertheless followed the implied order.

Krusty's griffon shifted from a sedate hover to the aerial equivalent of a flat-out sprint. The summon's wings beat almost fast enough to look like they were keeping it aloft without the aid of magic.

Minori's griffon gamely kept up, its own wings blurring. Minori hunched over the griffon as she directed it upwards and over the buildings. A fall from this height would be considerably riskier than the last fall she'd had, but she trusted Krusty to know when they'd need to return to street level.

"Can we ask the police for help?"

Krusty paused before answering. "They're already helping us keep track of the Genius. But answering the question you actually mean… In a word, no. We need to show we can handle this problem, if not exactly by ourselves, then at least without begging outsiders to join."

"And the helicopters don't count?"

"Of course not. We're just, let's say, keeping them out of trouble."

"What about Nureha?"

"She's left us out to dry. Bitch." Minori winced. Krusty cursing was something of a rarity. "I've been trying to fight a holding action until the JSDF gets here."

Krusty's griffon closed its wings to decide, dropping out of the sky. Minori's griffon followed in a stoop of its own, and she was briefly too distracted to talk.

"So our win condition is the JSDF. What's the full strategic situation?"

"The police are blocking the bridges leading here, as well as the road coming in from the north. The JSDF troops are almost here, but they're limited in the kind of ordnance they can deploy. In the meantime, we need to minimize casualties and property damage. The municipal government is still pretty mad at us about what happened the last time around."

"Understood."

The griffon's paths diverged, by unspoken consent. Minori's griffon landed on the hospital's white roof, and she slipped off its saddle. The hospital wasn't much taller than the surrounding buildings, but still provided a view of the area.

A number of medical tents stood in front of the hospital, where perhaps twenty people were treated for minor injuries.

"What happened here?" Minori and Krusty asked in tandem.

Minori opened the flap to her magic bag, reaching deep into it to grasp her staff.

"I don't remember," BologneseMaster replied.

That was troubling.

Minori surveyed the area as Krusty talked to the emergency personnel.

Like Kitasenju station, the neighborhood was quiet. This was turning out to be nothing like the all-out battle Minori had expected.

"It is towards your direction."

Minori didn't flinch, but her grip tightened over her staff. They couldn't have used the hospital as bait, could they? That was… all ethical concerns aside, it wasn't a bad idea. Geniuses were attracted to population centers, and the hospital would have a higher density of people than normal.

The Genius hadn't been at the hospital to begin with; this had been a clever way to circumvent the Genius's memory-erasing powers.

"There!"

"Where!? We can't see where you're pointing, BM!" Krusty whipped out his axe, to the mixed consternation and cheers of the hospital staff.

"South southwest, you ninny! Straight up the road!"

Minori snapped her attention to BologneseMaster's given direction.

The Genius approached.

It resembled a flatworm, all undulating flesh and iridescent patterns. No head or eyes were visible, but a crude form of bilateral symmetry was present in its oval shape. It floated perhaps half a meter above the ground, its fold occasionally touching the road.

Minori watched its glowing markings, trying to discern some pattern in how and when they flashed.

A single color would originate in the center of the Genius, then propagate outwards, modulated into different shades as it reached the monster's extremities.

Bands of lights would pulse from side to side, disturbed by localized irregularities. A CRT monitor too close to a magnet.

Pixels of light appeared, almost linking themselves into-

"Snap out of it!"

Minori flinched. She'd been so fixated on the Genius, she hadn't even realized how close it had gotten. How could anyone manage to forget it?

The genius flashed a pure, bright white.

Even as Minori was blinded, Krusty counterattacked.

"Covering!"

"Protective Barr-" No, Krusty's life wasn't the most valuable. "Dispelling Barrier!"

A massive barrier appeared, a translucent orange disc that stood perpendicular to the street. Slightly taller than the mid-rise buildings around it, it separated the hospital from the fight.

Krusty intercepted the Genius. A blast of overpressure pressed him backwards, his metal foot coverings- Minori believed the technical term was "sabatons"- dug into the road, leaving shallow furrows.

Gusts blew out from beneath the Genius.

Leaning further forward, Krusty stopped his slide. He took a step forward, then another. Using the butt of his axe like a walking stick, he pressed his assault between each wave of wind.

The Genius's wind attack stopped without warning. No longer hindered, Krusty pushed off the ground with enough force to crack concrete.

He spun his axe so its head was behind his legs. Then, he swung it forward in an underhand motion.

Blue juices sprayed out of the Genius, but magic mended it back together in short order.

 _Krusty: 72%. Genius: 98%. BologneseMaster, 50%._

As Krusty played his role as a tank, BologneseMaster's health was slowly ticking upwards. He hadn't lost any HP yet this fight, but previous encounters had left their toll on the diminutive felinoid.

The fact that the Genius was at nearly full health was worrying. It had to have some sort of healing ability.

Krusty reversed his grip on his battleaxe. Swinging it downwards, he carved another deep furrow into the Genius.

The Genius restarted its attack. Paint stripped from the asphalt, as Krusty was once again knocked back.

"BologneseMaster, draw aggro," Minori ordered.

BologneseMaster jumped from the top of a building, his parabolic trajectory bringing him directly over the monster.

The wind failed to hinder him, as Minori had suspected.

Rainbow lights glinted off of his meat cleaver, as he spun in mid-air.

"Stealth Blade!"

With the shouting and the spinning the attack was hardly stealthy, but evidently the "hit from behind" requirement was still fulfilled, as the Genius was cleaved neatly in two.

For a second, both halves of it remained motive. Minori's gut clenched.

But the half furthest away from Minori fell to the ground, spraying a torrent of fluids, as the "front" half regenerated.

BologneseMaster allowed the Genius's wind to push his slight frame backwards, adding its impulse to his own momentum as he ran up a building's face.

The genius's blinding attack repeated itself.

"This must be what getting microwaved feels like," Krusty remarked, withstanding the attack.

"If I took off that metal suit of yours, would I find beans? Because you sure cause a lot of hot air."

Minori snorted at BologneseMaster's jibe.

 _Krusty: 68%. Genius: 78%. BologneseMaster, 51%._

The rest of her party pressed the attack, as Minori spawned barrier after barrier around the front of the hospital.

Four percent health in return for twenty percent health and even some healing for their assassin was more than equitable. Surprising, even; boss monsters tended to have several times more health than players of their same level.

The Genius's lights dimmed, then shut off completely. Minori tried to ignore it so it wouldn't distract her, a feat made a lot easier by the fact that the street no longer pulsed magenta and lime despite being in the middle of the day.

For once, they'd been lucky enough to fight a genius inhabiting an ordinary monster's body. "Lucky enough" wasn't the same thing as lucky, though, and Minori had the sneaking suspicion the genius would- ha- v- ric- ks to pu- ll o&u&t asid$e fr%$om-

Minori blinked.

Her mana reserves didn't feel full, and she had her staff out. Below, a number of medical tents stood in front of the hospital, where perhaps twenty people were treated for minor injuries.

"What happened here?" Minori, Krusty, and BologneseMaster asked in tandem.

"It's heading north!"

The- the genius! Dammit!

Minori summoned her griffon.

Okay, she'd been on earth for…forty seven minutes. It had taken her about forty minutes to reach Kitasenju station, and doing some quick mental math, probably around two minutes to fly here.

So that put the fight at, at most, five minutes. For a boss monster, that was nothing; it had to be pretty flimsy, if three adventurers could make it run away.

How could Minori use that information to plan an attack, even without knowing anything about the monster?

As the party strategist, it was her role to keep track of HP and MP. So in the time since she last remembered checking on the other party members, she knew that Krusty had lost eight percent of his health, while BologneseMaster had gained a percent back.

Seven percent, over three people was one point three repeating percent, so since the the genius had run away, it was a safe bet that it had taken more damage than that.

Assuming a worst-case scenario where it was at full health and they'd dealt damage for the full five minutes, it would take three hundred and seventy-five minutes, or over six hours to deal enough damage to kill the Genius.

But Minori's gut feeling was that the worst case scenario was far too pessimistic, and with the time she had left she was fairly confident the Genius could be put down.

But how?

Obviously, the Genius needed to be herded towards a chokepoint, where Minori's party could whale on it to their hearts' content. They'd need to kite it somewhere, but who could they use as bait? Shiroe had worked during the Shibuya raid because of his mana reserve. But what could they use to draw this Genius? What did it want?

Or to phrase it in another manner, why had it come here?

Minori surveyed the area. Could the hospital be what had attracted it?

"Krusty, can you ask them why they're all outside?"

Krusty engaged down a harried nurse, while helping him fix a collapsed tent. Their speech was inaudible, but Krusty relayed his side of the conversation across party chat. "Given the condition, why are you all out here?"

"..."

"I asked you to? I don't remember that, but I hope I had a good reason."

That had to be a clue. Why would Krusty have made that request?

Well, all geniuses wanted empathiom. Empathiom, which took the form of memories. Oh.

A genius that took memories wasn't anything special. In fact, it was the opposite. All of them did it.

But one that could erase the memories of everyone in range… Well, logically speaking, it would want to head straight to densely populated areas. Like, say, public transit, metro stations, or a hospital under a sudden deluge of injuries.

Broadcasting her voice to the helicopter crews, Minori asked, "where is the Genius heading? Where have the flames already been put out?"

"It's been heading north and west, it looks like."

North and west… The roadblock, of course! Dozens of policemen would be densely packed across two bridges.

"We need to head towards the roadblock!"

"Gotcha."

"Understood."

All three called their griffons.

~oOo~

A/N: one of my friends spoiled me on how Re:Zero should have ended. If you understand why I'm mentioning that, I'm so sorry. :(


	25. Chapter 25

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 25**

~oOo~

It had only been a matter of time before the genius reached a roadblock. The odd bulge of the... Was it an island? Islet? Peninsula? The odd bulge of the landmass had two bridges and an overland road connecting it to the rest of Tokyo, but was still largely separated from the mainland by the Arakawa River.

As such, it had only been a matter of time until Krusty had the bright idea to corner the flighty Genius.

Though to Nureha's chagrin, she'd chosen the wrong roadblock to stand guard at.

No matter. She'd accounted for this possibility.

As she skirted around the edge of the landmass, she listened to KR's reports.

"The Plant Hwyaden PUGs here are doing pretty well, we've got some good mage support going. Tanks and fighters aren't doing much, though; Krusty told them in no uncertain terms to fuck off and not get in his way… Not counting the helicopters and police we've got twenty-two people here total, although six of them aren't affiliated with Plant Hwyaden..."

A pause, then, "Oh, wow, that's gotta hurt his pride. BologneseMaster's not doing so hot. Neither is Minori. She's keeping the Genius contained with her barriers, but her casting time's getting more uneven- wait, nevermind. She was just saving up mana to..."

Nureha tuned him out briefly as she made an aerobatic maneuver, turning a handspring into a vertical up. As an Enchanter physical exertion on this level strained even her adventurer constitution, but the cross-class movement skills she gained as a Fox Tail allowed her to maintain her punishing pace.

"...BologneseMaster's down, at least until Minori revives him, but that's nearly the end for…"

"..."

"KR?"

Nureha swore.

Slowing down, she removed her phone from her magic bag.

Refreshing Plant Hwyaden's internal forum, she opened the live thread on the Genius.

No new information appeared for a few minutes, but eventually a shaky stream was linked.

The monster was performing a roughly circular movement pattern on an empty road. No residential buildings stood nearby. Did it not have the tracking ability she'd banked on?

No, it had found the roadblock and the hospital in the first place.

Nureha watched more closely. The mumbling of the cameraman proved that it wasn't on a loop. That the video wasn't on a loop, anyways. The genius's movements were predictably repetitive, robotic in nature.

Over the course of perhaps a dozen cycles, she noticed the Genius gradually drift away from the filmer.

Nureha recalled something she'd heard Quon talking about. An old science fiction story where a malfunctioning robot had oscillated between an area where its drive to protect itself overrode its compulsion to follow orders, and an area where its drive to follow orders overrode its need to protect itself.

Perhaps something similar was happening here. The genius was caught between its directive to absorb empathiom, and its desire for self-preservation. But it was still drifting ever closer to the police blockade, so perhaps it downgraded its rating of threats in a way similar to the monsters of Elder Tale? An analogue of the hate mechanism, where a lack of recent damage would cause it to ignore previously dangerous enemies?

If she was right, she could predict the Genius's movements with a fair degree of accuracy.

But that was only half of the equation. Despite, or perhaps because of the time the Genius had spent without causing a ruckus, Krusty hadn't shifted from the blockade. But that made sense as well- the decision to go to the blockade had likely been made before their most recent fight. They'd remember where the Genius was going, but not that it had already been there.

Nureha smiled.

Predictability, the worst failure of a tactician. Holding all the cards wasn't useful in the long run if someone else was stacking the deck.

By her estimate, there were another fifteen minutes before the Genius reached the police blockade. And with neither side changing its tactics, the previous fight would be an excellent indicator of how Krusty would conduct the next one. And the one after that. And the one after that.

How could she integrate that information into her plans?

Changing environmental conditions likely wouldn't matter- in its attack phase, the genius was more than visible enough. Fatigue wasn't a problem, with the automatic repair of injuries magic granted. The helicopters would eventually run out of fuel, but they'd be replaced by others.

But the JSDF was already rolling tanks into the area, and as Minori's trick with the semi truck had shown, Geniuses weren't immune to being squished.

So, she couldn't afford to wait for Minori to time out. She didn't have to act immediately, but Nureha did need to act soon.

But she did, after all, know exactly where the injured monster would retreat to after its next assault.

And as a user of the "sprinkler" build, Nureha was one of the few enchanters with the attack power to take down enemies themselves.

Thus decided, she leaped off the building, shifting her course slightly to coincide with the streamer's location.

~oOo~

"It's a little weird hearing English translated, to be honest. Barely any American gamers came over to Yamato before the catastrophe, and with the fairy rings… well, you were there, so you know. Chinese and Korean translations are pretty decent, and I hear the Japanese to English translation works well too, but the way their sentences are structured kind of trips me up sometimes."

Nureha hummed. She sat with her legs dangling over the edge of a building. The newbie Plant Hwyaden member hadn't managed to stop checking out her ass when she'd stood, and for all that the attention was gratifying, it wouldn't do to distract them from filming the fight.

"But anyways, it sounds like this kid is Leonardo's brother. You know, Kero-nardo? I'll have to have a chat with him later. I can't really tell who the other two English speakers are. His parents, maybe? There's a blonde woman that looks kind of like him, but the other guy is a balding dude with a different skin tone, so I don't know about him."

Nureha glanced at her phone. Krusty and Minori were standing confidently, as were the police, but the Plant Hwyaden members milled around in a disorganized fashion. The Americans stood slightly apart from the rest of their group, holding a private conversation.

A little embarrassing for Plant Hwyaden, perhaps, but Nureha could hardly fault newbies for being, well, newbies.

"The fight's- uh- about to start, ma'am."

Nureha turned her head to face her minion and gave a warm, eye-creasing smile. He flushed, as Nureha reveled in his attention.

Nureha returned her attention to her phone screen. From this distance, she hoped to avoid the Genius's memory removal effect, while still maintaining the capability to intervene in the fight should she need to.

The fight started much the same as the previous, with neon-bright lights and an array of support players buffing Krusty as the combat-focused players cooled their heels impatiently just in front of the healer line.

But almost immediately, Nureha noticed something was off. The group wasn't doing nearly as much damage as the previous fight.

She resisted the impulse to smack herself on the forehead.

BolongneseMaster was dead- of course their DPS was lower!

And with the memory-stealing effect of the Genius, he'd missed his chance at revival because Minori hadn't even remembered he'd been killed. After all, assassins had a class-wide habit of fading out of notice when they weren't needed.

Normally, Nureha would have been indifferent or outright gleeful that Akihabara's delegation had been reduced yet again. But this time it was something of an inconvenience: geniuses were the common enemy of every faction on Theldesia.

She briefly considered assisting the group, but ultimately decided to stick to her original plan.

Onscreen, Krusty slowly circled around the genius to put himself between it and escape.

Each time his battleaxe connected with the ground, she felt the tremors a moment later.

From where she sat, she could feel the faint breeze of the wind generated from the Genius.

Then, in contravention of hate mechanics, the genius attacked the healers. An amber ray of light charred the road and set fire to police cars, in spite of the purification and protective barriers Minori threw up with preternatural precision.

KR's shout wasn't audible, but his exaggerated facial movements made lipreading easy even from the distance the camera was set up at.

"Covering!"

He intercepted an attack meant for a balding American.

His battleaxe spun like a dervish, carving furrow after furrow into the Genius.

The amber light re-appeared, but Minori's preparations again minimized the damage.

The genius began to glow white.

"Anchor Howl, Castle of Stone!"

The Genius ceased its attack, evidently unwilling to trigger Anchor Howl's ability by indirectly harming anyone he could be partied with. The wind stopped.

The American, evidently a Medicine Man, triggered his Ghost Walk ability, a translucent duplicate of him appearing.

Smart. With Anchor Howl, drawing aggro to himself would result in massive damage to the Genius, and Ghost Walk would mitigate the threat posed by the Genius.

He stepped forwards, possibly to maximize his chances of accurate spell usage.

And that was when the sidelined players decided to make their move.

As one, they rushed forward to attack the genius, lead by the same sort of herd mentality Nureha had spent so much time learning to exploit.

Nureha frowned. While Elder Tale's level scaling was relatively gentle for new players, they were still massively outclassed by the Genius's capabilities.

It initially seemed like they were making some headway, the Genius losing chunks of its health bar at an impressive rate.

And then the calm of the storm concluded.

An explosion of air knocked the novice fighters back. Some, off their feet. Others, off the bridge.

They'd be fine. Probably.

Four fighters and the Medicine Man were left in the near vicinity of the Genius.

Six seconds remained in Castle of Stone.

Leonardo's brother sprung forwards, a translucent tiger appearing around him.

The older American yelled something at the younger. From the panicked look on his face, a request to stop. Had he already timed the genius's attack?

A pinprick of amber appeared over the genius.

Nazca lines were burnt into the pavement. Constellations danced over the ground, as totems thrust themselves out from the pavement.

The older American succeeded at drawing aggro.

Ghost Walk ran out of time.

Even as the Medicine Man's God-Dropping ceremony activated, the Genius activated its attack.

Krusty unfroze.

"Cov-"

It was not a pretty death. Superheated by the light, the man's skin boiled, and his organs erupted like lava out of his body.

Magic tried to repair the damage, but it was futile.

"-ering."

Krusty blocked the light with his body.

A raw, primal scream emerged from his throat. This, Nureha didn't need lipreading to understand. Even from her position, it was audible. Even from her position, it was _loud._ Chills went down her back, as the Krusty onscreen transformed from the refined warrior to someone truly deserving of his epithet, "berserker."

She'd heard about the Mnemosyne Taboo. But to see it in person was something else entirely.

Spiderwebs of cracked concrete appeared with each step he took. A downwards swing set off a cacophony of car alarms. Mana roiled off of him in waves so thick they were visible. So thick, she suspected they would even be tangible.

And still, the Genius made its escape.

Nureha's fingers twitched, and she disengaged them from her dress before it was torn.

She did her best to pretend the death had just been perfectly ordinary. That the man would respawn in the cathedral. That this competition between her and Krusty hadn't just led an innocent man to his grave. To believe that the world was a cold place, where any feeling the man had had were ultimately irrelevant, where not a single iota of goodwill or selflessness could exist.

She did her best to steady her uneven breathing. She did her best to unclench her fists.

She- she…

She had to finish this. If she had any self-respect as an adventurer at all, she had to finish this.

Ten, then twenty, then thirty orbs appeared above her head, miniature suns blazing with the intensity of her fury.

 _Only she_ had the right to determine who died.

Nureha made visual contact with the demon.

Covered in its own internal fluids, it made a sorry sight. Even with the sharp boost in HP it had gained after the fight, it had still barely reached twenty percent of its capacity.

Nureha chose her target, and obliterated it.

In the near distance, a pillar of light pierced the heavens.

~oOo~

A/N: Coming clean here, the original plan had been to kill Michael and have him turn into an adventurer, but I decided that it would be out of character for him to play the hero. Thus, the guy he met back on the plane dies instead.


	26. Chapter 26

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 26**

~oOo~

"Earth is on the brink of a new era. And if we don't act now, we won't be part of it."

Krusty growled and shook his head. "No, cross that out. Too gloomy."

Minori dutifully struck out the line. Covered as it was in dense black ink, the piece of paper was no longer useful. She folded it in half thrice, then chucked it in the wastebasket, to join a small heap of other, similar pages.

Krusty muttered under his breath as he paced.

He'd have preferred to have a speech written down and ready to go to give Minori for transport long before she arrived, but Nureha had timed her announcement perfectly.

Their schedules for the past three days had been too carefully regimented; he hadn't had anywhere near an adequate amount of time to write.

And with the fight fresh in the public's memory, it was imperative that he had something to counter Nureha.

He slowed down, exhaling to calm himself. Minori wasn't dumb, and now wasn't the time for pride.

"Any suggestions?"

Minori frowned, the plume of her quill half-covering her mouth.

He tried to hash out a plan, but all Krusty could think of was the fact that Minori was ignoring his perfectly good supply of ballpoint pens for such an outdated writing implement. Did it have some sort of magical property? Was Shiroe's (lack of) fashion sense rubbing off on her?

"We need to get Adventurers across more than ever, but how can we possibly convince the Round Table Alliance to work any harder than it already is on the problem?" Minori wondered.

The room went silent aside from Krusty's footsteps.

How had Nureha managed to get so far under his skin?

In any other situation, he'd be sitting coolly at his desk, trademark smirk on as he planned.

But Nureha was the worst kind of enemy- the kind that stayed just outside his engagement range, where he couldn't strike without overextending.

"A nuclear option." Minori perked up slightly. Elissa paled, the tips of her elfin ears lowering like a cornered cat's. Lenessia, of course, had long since dozed off. "That's what we need. Not a literal one, but something we can threaten Plant Hwyaden with to deter them from pulling sh-stuff like this."

Elissa disapproved of cursing, Krusty remembered just in time. Lenessia's handmaiden had always been something of a stickler for proper behavior.

Minori frowned. "I think that's a bit harsh. Plant Hwyaden isn't evil, they're just, you know, lead by an evil person."

And really, that was what made the current situation so difficult.

Had Plant Hwyaden been truly evil, their promise of unlimited Adventurer Contracts would have been far easier to counter. The subtext of Nureha's speech had indicated that they'd removed the escape clause from their contracts, yes. But without proof of malicious intent, Nureha was free to wrap the public around her finger.

Not that Krusty bought their "item duplication bug" excuse for a second, of course. He was tentatively willing to believe that removing the escape clause allowed them to make Adventurer Contracts with slightly more common materials, but a duplication bug? Preposterous.

They popped up occasionally, sure, but with their immense potential for abuse were invariably patched within days of discovery, if not hours.

Though the Catastrophe had sort of prevented Atharva from hotfixing the Homesteading the Noosphere expansion…

But considering the fact that no other bugs had been found, even the omnipresent clipping and collision issues mysteriously gone, it wouldn't make sense for an item duplication bug, of all things, to be left intact.

So they had discovered some way to easily acquire Phantasmal materials, and had had it for quite a while.

Krusty didn't want to admit it, even to himself, but revealing exactly how to make an Adventurer contract so quickly had been a miscalculation. Sure, he'd accomplished his main goals with the gambit- calming down the general public and baiting Plant Hwyaden into revealing any relevant overskills they'd discovered.

But he hadn't accounted for the Genius, and that had been his undoing.

The noise of the protesters outside his house rose and fell, like waves lapping against a beach.

The demonstrations had been peaceful so far.

"So, I heard you were looking for options…"

For such a small, cute summon, KR's carbuncle certainly demanded a lot of attention.

Unable to suppress his instincts, Krusty found himself pointing his battleax at the small, foxlike creature.

"Whoa, whoa, calm down!"

After a moment of, Krusty relaxed his grip on his battleax. After another, Elissa tucked her knife back into her dress.

Minori de-activated her barrier spell.

Krusty idly noticed it had been facing towards him, rather than away from him.

"What's the meaning of this?"

Minori spoke up. "He's willing to give us information. I put him on my friendslist after the Kitasenju Raid."

"So you just let him track you wherever you go?"

Minori's face morphed into a mulish expression. "Yes."

"But..." Krusty sighed. "Fine. If you thought it was a good idea, I trust you."

Minori looked somewhat surprised, and more than a little gratified, at his comment.

"So, what's this information?"

"In brief, Indicus figured out that Fullers and Knife Grinders generate something from nothing, so with a little bit of rules-lawyering, we can now make unlimited amounts of phantasmal-class items."

Krusty blinked. "But doesn't that violate-"

"-conservation of mass? Of course. But I've long since accepted that we're living in some wacky simulation for the amusement of higher beings, where the rules are made up and the points don't matter."

"And that's it?"

KR shrugged. "Basically? Yeah. There's some fancy stuff she's doing with tailors to speed up production, but that's all you really need to start mass producing Adventurer Contracts yourself.

"And you're telling us this, why?"

"Ever had your mother tell you to eat your food, 'cause there're children starving in Africa?"

Krusty's brows furrowed. "Where are you going with this?"

"Well, mine did, and she was right. Maybe not so much on the 'eat your food' part, but I digress. There _are_ children starving in Africa. And dying of dysentery. And getting killed in wars. And I think you get the point."

KR looked directly into Krusty's eyes, his face growing more serious and his voice becoming less flippant. "And we can end that. We _have_ to end that. I used to be a doctor. I've seen what death- real death, not the slap on the wrist we get- does to families, to friends. Slow or fast, it doesn't matter. Maybe there's an afterlife. With everything I've seen in Theldesia, I'm not ruling one out. But can we afford the risk that there isn't?"

"So what? You don't have any proof this isn't just a ploy to waste our time while Plant Hwyaden makes more portal generators. You expect me to believe you're doing this out of pure altruism?"

The carbuncle's ears laid back on its head. Whether it was an elfin or canid reflex, Krusty didn't know. But KR's annoyance was perfectly clear. "What else? News flash: not everyone is as cold-blooded as you are. I know you're doing your hardest to forget ever being human, but not all of us are _politicians._ " KR spat out his closing sentence with a surprising degree of vehemence.

Krusty tried to not let the irony of being told that by an elf wearing a carbuncle suit distract him. He let his voice drop in volume, adding a quiet intensity to his tone.

"You're calling me cold blooded? When you cynically joined a guild that, might I remind you, is actively trying to enslave entire nations? Don't act like you're blind to what Indicus has been doing."

KR's body shuddered, as he kept whatever his first response was under wraps. He breathed in and out slowly, calming himself. "For us, death is cheap. I'd offer to martyr myself, but who would care? It doesn't matter that I'm willing to die for my cause. It does matter that I'm willing to kill for it."

Elissa flicked out her hidden knife in an elegant motion, lunging forward to press it against KR's neck.

KR gave her a flat stare. "No, I'm not threatening your precious princess. But this little stalemate we have, where you can justify keeping your portals closed because of the risk of genius attacks, and we can't justify opening ours for the same reason? One statement from me, and that stalemate is broken. I like acting goofy, but I didn't get to be one of the ten seats by being an idiot."

Krusty began a response but was cut off by Minori.

"Stop. Please. Look, I- I don't think KR is lying. Not about this. We're on different sides, but we don't have to be enemies."

A half-smile appeared on KR's face. "I appreciate the vote of-"

"Shut up."

Krusty blinked. Minori was more assertive that her childish appearance suggested, but it was rare for her to be rude.

"Just because you're right doesn't mean you're _in_ the right. You just used people's _lives_ as a bargaining tool. How badly do you want us to believe you?"

"Pretty badly, I guess. But I mean, come on- it wouldn't be that hard to check. A few days, tops."

Conveniently ignoring that a few days could easily make the difference between peaceful protesting and rioting. And while the Round Table Alliance waited for a solution, rivers of gold were flushed down the toilet fighting off monsters caused by magic buildup. It was only a matter of time before some critical piece of infrastructure was damaged.

"If you feel that strongly, then I want to make a deal with you."

"Oh, like that old American game show?"

KR's forced levity fell rather flat, as Elissa still hadn't seen fit to remove her blade from his neck.

"Renounce Plant Hwyaden. Publicly."

"Woah, that's a little far. You may not know this, but Plant Hwyaden owns the Minami cathedral. If I get blacklisted from it, I'm just as mortal as a regular human."

"And who's going to tell Indicus that you betrayed her? You're Nureha's only link to Theldessia."

"I've said this before-. I _hope_ I'm Indicus's only point of contact, but I just don't know if that's true."

"You're willing to gamble with the lives of innocent bystanders. Why aren't you willing to gamble with your own?"

"You're asking a lot of me…" KR smiled weakly. "But I suppose you're right. Gimme your phone, and I can start."

Krusty nodded. "Elissa, you can stop threatening him."

He pulled out his phone, while trading a glance with Minori.

Another mark for the classic good cop/bad cop routine.


	27. Chapter 27 - End

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 27**

~oOo~

Minori crossed her staff with Roe2's. The wooden rods thunked gently, then both whipped their respective implements back, sliding across the ground. Minori observed Roe2's face closely, trying to guess at her next move.

Roe2 telegraphed an overhead strike.

Minori pushed forward, forcing Roe2 to abandon her attack.

Roe2 growled, jumping backwards.

Minori twirled her staff, then used the momentum of the metal head to strike at Roe2's side.

The staffs bounced off each other as Roe2 blocked her, then retaliated with quick, jabbing motions.

The sound of sandals sliding across sand and grass, interspersed with wood smacking against wood, filled the clearing.

Minori sustained a number of minor hits, but Roe2 remained untouched as she lorded her reach advantage over her shorter opponent.

Minori caught herself thinking that it was a little unfair that Roe2 got a staff nearly twice as long as hers. Some people were just unfairly blessed.

Pushing the butt end of her staff through the hooked end of Roe2's, Minori pulled the staff towards her.

She jumped forward, explosively leaving the ground to-

-get unceremoniously kneed in the face.

Dazed, she slumped down.

The smell of iron briefly filled her nostrils, before disappearing.

"Oww…"

The pain faded quickly, but the humiliation lingered.

Roe2 snorted. "Don't look at me like that. You asked for the practice session, and I'm even trying to be gentler this time around."

"Yeah, gentler," Minori grumbled. "You've been hitting me across the face with your rod all evening."

"Aww, poor Minori. Do you need your big sister to kiss it better?"

Minori shot Roe2 a dirty look.

"No, I'm fine."

She pushed herself up off the ground, grabbing her staff. Dusting off her robes, Minori mumbled uncharitable things about her class-mandated uniform.

Sure, it looked cool (and had some pretty decent defensive bonuses), but she envied Tohya's practical, efficient armor.

She didn't envy the chafing, though. That he could keep.

"You done for the day?"

"I don't _feel_ done for the day," Minori replied.

Both walked towards the center of the field.

Grass stains on their clothing indicated how long they'd been practicing, although Minori was a fair bit dirtier than Roe2.

"What's eating at you, then?"

"Nothing!"

Roe2 looked over her glasses, disbelieving.

Minori frowned. "Nothing. I mean it."

"You're a terrible liar, kid. Leave the deception to me and big brother."

Roe2 waited for a few moments, then sighed. She tapped the ground with her staff, the flicked it out in front of her.

Minori did the same.

They crossed staffs, tapped them, and retracted them.

Minori jabbed in front of her, one handed, like a fencer. Probing strikes, to get inside Roe2's defenses.

Nonchalantly, Roe2 stuck her staff through the ornament on Minori's. Wrenching it out of Minori's hand, Roe2 flung the staff out of the clearing and into the forest.

"Big sis! Why would you do that?"

Roe2 shrugged. "To win."

Grumbling, Minori stormed off to retrieve her staff.

Roe2 easily kept pace with her.

"C'mon. Tell me what's wrong."

"No."

"Come oooonnnn," she wheedled.

"I'm especially not going to tell you if you're being annoying." Roe2 was taking her role as 'big sister' entirely too seriously, Minori decided. For a centuries(?)-old alien intelligence, she could be remarkably immature.

"Is this about the Plant Hwyaden situation?"

" _No_ this isn't about the Plant Hwyaden situation."

"What did I just say, Minori? Let me and Big Brother do the deception. You're too upstanding to lie correctly."

Minori ignored her.

Arms reached around her, and in short order she found herself being squeezed against Roe2.

"Agh! Why!?"

"Because you're being all pouty, that's why! Come on, just tell me!" In a sing-song voice, Roe2 said, "you know you want to~"

"I've already talked about it with Shiroe."

"Ahh, so there _is_ something to talk about! And you obviously haven't talked about it enough; you've been distracted for the past hour."

Minori ignored her, in favor of wriggling out of Roe2's embrace.

Fast walking, she retrieved her staff.

Minori turned back to face the training field and resumed walking.

Roe2 went silent, for a while. Then: "alright, I can tell you still need to think about it. But if I had to take a wild guess and give you some sisterly advice… A lot of the time, I've noticed you humans have a disconnect between what you think you want, and what you actually want. Figure out if you're having that problem, and everything else becomes a whole lot easier."

"And your people don't have that problem?"

"Well, not really. Maybe a little bit… Look, we're talking about you here, not me. En garde!"

Minori laughed a little at Roe2 almost literally deflecting attention.

The audio for a telepathic call played in Minori's head. Sending an apologetic look to Roe2, she accepted it.

"What is it, Roderick?"

"Minori, I'm sorry to call, but we're running a little short on spellcasters. Would you be willing to provide help?"

"Of course."

"Great, thank you. We're in the main lab."

The call ended.

"Big sis, Roderick needs me to provide mana. Would you be willing to help as well?"

Roe2 shook her head. "Sorry, Minori. As long as I'm representing the Travelers, I can't act for free outside of personal matters. It weakens our bargaining position."

"That's fine. Thanks for all the help!" Minori bowed.

Roe2 smiled. "Anytime."

~oOo~

Minori chatted with Roderick as she pumped mana into a repository. She kept a careful eye on her rate of depletion; there was a sweet spot between using too much mana and wasting some, and using not enough mana and failing to condense enough for it to hold together while it was absorbed and stored.

Four Fullers, and two dozen Knife Grinders sat on long tables or stools. They cut squares out of what could, with some creative interpretation, be called clothing and armor. Each item was created of one material, and one material only.

Depositing the squares in buckets, they'd then repair the clothing, fixing the holes with magic.

Occasionally, a hole was too big and the magic of the Fullers and Armorers spontaneously failed. When that happened, Roderick's employees took careful notes on the size of the holes, size of the garment, and level of the adventurer. Then, the garment was replaced by another and placed in a pile for tailors to repair later.

The tailors would need material, but with the pace of production, that wouldn't be a problem.

A steady supply of mana (and coffee) kept the entire process going.

"-and after we realized our methods for getting ink back out of cloth weren't going to supply our needs, we figured out that our setup of the Adventurer Contracts wasn't going to work. Obviously, we wouldn't sink to Plant Hwyaden's level and remove the escape clause, but Tetra, of all people, suggested that we change 'joining a guild' to 'adding to the friendslist.' Michitaka and I were doubtful at first, as we'd figured Shiroe would think of that, but then he said he hadn't risked changing the formula. It took some discussion, but we decided the suggestion had merit. We had to use one of our overskill consultations, but Roe2 and her allies did the analysis for us, and with the new setup, we only need one phantasmal material. Paper from the Fairy King is more difficult to get than ink from the Time Dragon's eye by raiding, but it's a breeze to manufacture."

Minori nodded, bemused. People always harped on supervillains for revealing their evil plans, but in her experience, the mad scientist types really did just want some validation.

A sprite briefly popped into existence, only to be swiftly executed.

Minori toned down her rate of mana transfer just a little bit.

"The repositories are still a little leaky," she commented.

"Yes, that's true…" Roderick trailed off. "Hold on a second, these need some adjusting." He walked away, presumably to alleviate the mana leakage.

Minori returned to her thoughts, idly performing her assigned task.

Her mind kept churning through Roe2's words.

Minori had to admit- there was some truth to them. After KR's speech, she'd been rather fixated on the potential for worldwide immortality. But even though things were going extremely well, all told, she didn't quite feel satisfied. Something nagged at the back of her mind, something she'd, if not exactly forgotten, was overlooking.

But she hadn't figured it out in the half hour since she left Roe2, and chewing over the problem endlessly wasn't productive.

Instead, she ruminated about something Krusty had said. A 'nuclear option.' What did that even mean? Obviously, Krusty wasn't really talking about a weapon. But the Akihabara Round Table needed something decisive, to swing public discourse back in their favor. They'd started from a position of relative strength, but Nureha had been wearing away at their advantages.

"So, what problem are you trying to solve?"

With Roderick's return, Minori increased her mana output again.

"Not really a problem, exactly. But back on earth, Krusty mentioned that we needed some sort of 'nuclear option,' and I'm trying to figure out what that could be."

"A 'nuclear option,' huh? I guess that American he traveled with rubbed off on him. Nothing comes to mind immediately, but we could try some word association."

"Word association?"

"I say a bunch of words, and we see if any of them spark your imagination."

"Okay, that could work."

"Uh, let's see. Energy. Free. Moon. Engine. Avocado."

"Avocado?"

Roderick shrugged. "Sorry, I'm a little hungry. On on that line of reasoning, filler, catalyst, enzyme, battle… Uh, armor, _amor_ , uhm, Michael?"

"What?"

Roderick blinked "well, Akatsuki said…" he trailed off, as Minori rolled her eyes.

" _Akatsuki_ is incredibly possessive of Shiroe, and is perfectly willing to stoop to slander if she feels like it'll reduce my chances with him."

"Oh, so you think you have a chance?"

"I- well-" Minori blushed. In a quiet voice, she said, "not really, no."

Roderick chuckled. "But I take it that you're not interested in this 'Michael?'"

Minori shook her head. "No. I just, I don't know, see myself in him. Back when I was brand new, Shiroe showed me and Tohya the ropes, and now that I have the chance to do the same for another player, I'm passing on the favor."

"Are we calling them 'players' then? The people back home who've figured out magic, I mean. And by the way, I'm really sorry that we poached Robert from you."

Minori almost waved Roderick off, before remembering what she was doing.

"No, it's fine. Shiroe put in the escape clause for a reason; we never expected to only use the contracts on possible Log Horizon members. And anyways, you guys can make better use of his knowledge than we can. And as for whether we're calling them 'players' or not, I don't think it'll really matter. Once we can get a few people trained as Fullers and Knife Grinders on the other side, contract-making will snowball fast, and pretty much everyone will become an Adventurer in a few years."

"Almost like a chain reaction, then." Roderick looked at Minori expectantly.

"What?"

"Well, we were just talking about a 'nuclear option.' I was hoping that would set you off."

Minori shook her head. "No, nothing's crossing my-" A strange look passed over her face.

"A chain reaction… escape… A nuclear option, matter to energy, something from nothing…" Minori frowned. There was something, just on the edge of her conscious mind. An ephemeral idea, not quite yet materialized.

Minori recalled Roe2's words. Before the politics, before the Geniuses, before this entire business with immortality contracts, she'd just been curious. Shiroe had shown her that Theldesia wasn't a prison. That it was awful, but in the archaic sense of the word. That it inspired fear, but also wonder. That if she just cared to look, there was always something new, just around the corner.

When the experiment had led to results beyond all but their wildest dreams, she'd fantasized about not just finally reuniting with her parents, but showing Theldesia to everyone back home.

How had Kanami put it? "I want to show this world to my daughter, it's so big and pretty?"

Because it was, Minori realized. She wasn't satisfied just working on these immortality contracts because they felt like a distraction. She wanted people to be safe, and to not die, but on an emotional level, what really struck a chord was the idea of moving past the pitiful trickle of people moving between worlds.

"Well?"

Minori groaned, her thoughts dashing out of her grasp like startled cats.

"Ah, I'm sorry." Roderick ran his hand through his white hair, contrite. "I always get annoyed when I'm interrupted, but then I'm such a monstrous hypocrite about interrupting others."

Minori's eyes widened. Monstrous. Monsters! That was the last puzzle piece she was looking for.

"If you had glasses, you'd be pushing them up," commented Roderick.

"Monsters appear when we have too much mana. Long term mana buildup results in so many monsters spawning that they cause even more monsters to spawn, and that's how we get dungeons. So monsters must generate their own mana…"

"...which we can gather," whispered Roderick, realizing where Minori's thoughts had gone. "So we can harvest as much mana as we need from dungeons! That'll cut down on the cost of generating mana significantly, although we'll need to figure out how to pipe mana in from a nearby dungeon…"

Minori shook her head. "That's not necessary. With the mana sink, we already have everything we need right here in Akihabara."

"Are you suggesting that we make a dungeon of our own, so to speak?"

"Is there any reason we couldn't?"

Roderick blinked. "No. Not at all. Well, aside from the fact that we can't risk letting the amount of monsters get out of control… but that's not a problem either, because we can dump as much excess mana as we need to into the city's defense grid!"

"How long will it take you to set this up? A few weeks? I need to know how much time we need to buy."

Roderick smirked. "We can use the fairy gates to assemble our mages, most of the materials we need are already in-city, and this new method for producing phantasmal materials is exponentially faster than raiding. I can probably have a prototype out by noon tomorrow. Assuming I don't get any sleep, but that's a foregone conclusion. And even a prototype would be all we'd need to start getting people through."

"That's fantastic! What do you need me to do?"

"For now, just keep feeding these guys mana. Also, contact Shiroe. We're going to need his expertise."

Minori nodded. "Got it."

"I'll leave you to it." Roderick laughed giddily. "Wow, what a day."

~oOo~

The black and yellow police tape had been replaced. Japanese military personnel faced both towards and away from a circular patch of concrete, forming a formidable human barrier. Their uniform and imposing riot gear formed a tangible break between the thousands of onlookers and the empty space.

The dull roar of the crowd remained at an even pitch.

A white dot appeared in midair, barely visible.

It remained mostly unnoticed, for a while, but as those who saw it told their friends, a wave of noise spread outwards.

The portal opened. Perpendicular, rather than parallel to the ground.

No one came through.

It oscillated between less than a yard to almost four yards across, not quite coming into contact with the concrete.

Finally stabilizing, the portals size eventually fixed on about three yards in diameter.

The first person through was a short young man, a little over five feet. Michael recognized him largely by virtue of the news coverage after his death, although he couldn't remember his name.

BologneseMaster came through directly afterwards. He turned to give Michael a quick wave, but was immediately preoccupied with re-reuniting with his family.

And then, as promised, his brother came through.

Leonardo looked around, seemingly a little put off by the crowd.

Michael waved. Banking on his parents being a little too emotionally compromised to reprimand him, he yelled, "Hey, dickhead, over here!"

Leonardo turned his head and grinned.

A moment later, Michael found himself in a headlock he really should have expected.

"Ow! Stop it!" Michael tried to activate one of his monk abilities, but an aura flared around Leonardo, and Michael's attempt failed.

Dominance asserted, Leonardo let go of him. Michael stepped back, smoothing down his hair as Leonardo embraced their parents.

Glancing at the portal, Michael noticed that a steady stream of people was now flowing out of it.

A woman wearing gauntlets and a crop top, a tiny girl in a lacy dress. A boy with fox ears, a pink-haired bodybuilder. Catboys and catgirls, dwarves and elves. (Alvs?)

An impromptu ramp had been assembled out of milk crates and pallets, although many of the adventurers simply leapt over the distance.

Journalists and scientists were lining up in front of a military checkpoint to gain entry to Theldesia.

All the while, camera flashes strobed, and the crowd roared.

As he watched the spectacle from near its center, a hard-to-describe feeling swept over Michael.

The certainty that this was "it." That whatever happened, this moment was destined to be in the history books.

 **~Fin~**

A/N: Only two more chapters of epilogue left to go.


	28. Chapter 28 - Epilogue 1

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 28 - Epilogue #1**

~oOo~

When he stepped over the threshold, no lights turned on. No streamers or balloons fell from the ceiling, and no partygoers yelled a "Welcome Back!"

But Tohya still paused, overwhelmed.

Tohya's dad placed a hand on Tohya's shoulder.

"Your room's like you left it, unless Minori messed with it in the past few weeks."

"Did you?" He directed his question to Minori.

"You'll see." She smirked.

Tohya flicked on the lights, reveling in the experience of not having to reach up to manipulate the light switch.

The whole area looked subtly wrong to him, and he tried to figure that out as the rest of his family shuffled inside.

"Not being in your wheelchair gives you a different perspective on things, eh?"

" _Daiki!"_

Tohya chuckled, drawing strange looks from his parents, and a questioning one from Minori.

He shrugged. "I'm over it."

And he was, literally and figuratively.

~oOo~

Despite it being three in the morning, an ungodly hour even by adventurer standards, a sizeable crowd of people surrounded the portal.

With the restrictions on entry into Theldesia and most of the Adventurers who wanted to return home already back in Japan, foot traffic through the portal had decreased substantially. Rather than people, crates of electronics and machines were ferried across. A snake's nest of cables ran through the portal as internet and phone network connectivity were hastily jury-rigged.

But even at this hour, the cafe Kanami found herself at was packed as people took advantage of exactly that.

At the table immediately to her left, Misa and Reize of DDD fought over how to handle the social media cult of personality that had sprung up around Krusty, while two tables to her right Nazuna and Tetra took provocative selfies.

The rest of the tables were similarly occupied as senior guild members too valuable to cross took advantage of the newly installed internet.

This late at night, most of Japan was asleep, but that just meant it was the ideal time to call people who lived overseas.

For the task, she used one of the dirt-cheap, disposable cellphones handed out earlier. The touchscreens were the shitty, unresponsive kind that screwed up whenever so much as a drop of water got on them, but to someone who'd gone without internet connectivity for two years, even this cheap technology was a godsend.

Kanami's heart rose into her throat as the phone rang. She fiddled with the buckle of her magic bag as she waited for a response.

"...Who is this?"

"Honey?"

"Kanami!?"

"Yep!"

"So you're back in Japan? Fantastic! I've been planning to fly back with our daughter, but didn't manage to get plane tickets until yesterday. I've just missed you so much…"

Tears rolled down Kanami's cheeks, finally hearing her husband's voice for the first time in two years.

"Well actually, I'm not in Japan yet…"

"So you're still in… Akibahara, was it? Did they not let you come back?"

"Akihabara, actually. But no, I could have come back. It's just that I was kind of hoping that we could be reunited on this side of the portal. I just have so much to show you!"

"Really? I mean, I'd love to come, and I think Inoue would too, but I heard that it's kind of hard to get across."

"Pssh, I know a guy, it'll be fine. So tell me about Inoue… I've missed so much."

"Yeah, you have." Kanami could imagine the wistful smile on her husband's face. "Well to begin with, her first day of kindergarten was pretty memorable…"

Both talked well into the morning.

~oOo~

Yuta unclipped the press pass from his shirt.

After fiddling with the little paper name tag to make sure it sat just right in its plastic cover, he clipped it back on.

Task complete, he returned to fiddling idly with his thumbs. He had his phone in his breast pocket but badly wanted to make a good impression, and playing vapid mobile games wouldn't.

Time passed by agonizingly slowly. The man he was supposed to shadow wasn't late, but Yuta had slept so poorly in anticipation of the meeting he'd eventually given up on rest and just showed up to this meeting place hours early.

He'd occupied himself for a time by marking down notes and idly sketching the bustling stalls and ivy-covered buildings, but for the same reason he'd stayed off his phone, he'd closed his notebook and put his pen away.

Once again, he removed his press pass, as much to make sure it was aligned correctly as to have something to do with his fingers.

Seeing his target approaching, he hastily clipped it back on.

Yuta had obsessively studied the photographs brought across from Theldesia, desperately hoping to be one of the first reporters across. So the black-haired man and his short attaché were instantly recognizable, but for politeness sake, Yuta made sure to verify their identities.

"Shiroe, Akatsuki?"

"That would be us."

Yuta shivered a little as they examined him. He bowed low, aware that he was in the presence of perhaps the most powerful man in Yamato server.

Rising, he said, "I'm honored to meet you, and immensely grateful for the opportunity to shadow you."

"Ah, that's really no problem, Mr. Tanaka."

Dammit! He'd just called them by their first names, without even realizing it. Stupid, stupid, _stupid_.

"Yuta is fine, if that's not too forward. Uhm, sir."

Shiroe nodded.

"Lord Shiroe, Michitaka has deposited the prototype back in the warehouse."

 _Lord_ Shiroe? Fuck fuck fuck-

Shiroe pinched his nose with his fingers. In a quiet voice, he said, "ignore Akatsuki, just call me Shiroe. Come on, I have something interesting to show you."

Embarrassed that his minor freakout had been noticed, Yuta meekly followed the pair. The walk was quiet, Shiroe occasionally relating random tidbits about how such and such stand had just been erected, or greeting and being greeted by passer-by.

Yuta, of course, religiously wrote everything down.

Akatsuki popped in and out of view, seemingly disappearing every time his eyes weren't on her. Every so often he thought he heard her speak, but her words were always pitched too low to be audible over the general hubbub.

She must have been talking over telepathy, Yuta concluded.

The walk took almost an hour and a half, but they eventually reached what was evidently their destination.

Turning to face Yuta, Shiroe said, "sorry about all the boring minutiae, I haven't had a lot of experience talking to the press… Hopefully you should find this more interesting, though." Shiroe chuckled, the light reflecting off his glasses in a way that managed to be ominous despite the fact that they were in a public area in the middle of the day.

Unnerved, Yuta said, "no, that's not a problem."

He obsessed over whether his response had been appropriate as they entered the warehouse.

After the entrance was only a bare, poorly lit room. Shiroe knocked on one of the corrugated metal walls. A disc of magical energy appeared, then, after a moment, disappeared. A door swung outwards.

"It's a pretty basic security measure," Shiroe explained. "Doesn't stop anyone determined, but it's enough to make sure no one's here by accident."

Yuta resumed rubbernecking as he followed Shiroe and Akatsuki through the door.

He'd expected complex machinery, or maybe a pentagram ringed by black candles.

Instead, he got both. Mostly, anyways. There weren't any candles, as the space was instead lit by an array of hovering magical lights. But there was plenty of machinery covered in arcane diagrams. A steampunk renaissance fair of exposed piping and odd knick-knacks filled rack after rack.

"Follow me," Shiroe said.

Yuta flinched, noticing he'd gotten sidetracked and stopped walking.

"Sorry!"

"It's not a problem."

Yuta resumed taking notes as he followed them.

"Here, this is the corridor."

If his cursory examination wasn't wrong, these racks were less full than the others.

As if reading Yuta's thoughts (could he do that?), Shiroe said, "We fill these warehouses chronologically, right to left. This is one of the newest shelves, so there's less stuff here."

"And... here it is."

Akatsuki pulled out what looked like a stack of paper from the bottom rack.

She handed it to Shiroe, and he flipped it over to show Yuta.

On a closer examination, calling it a "stack" of paper wasn't correct. Yuta could see that crystal rods through the papers held them together, and often there were gaps between smaller stacks of paper.

"It's my understanding," Shiroe began, "that there's some concern over how we're making and distributing adventurer contracts. There's been some criticism about how we're auctioning most of them off to the highest bidder, instead of handing them straight to hospitals. I'm sure you've heard about that?"

Yuta nodded.

"Well, fundamentally speaking, the problem is one of labour. After our time here in Theldesia, few of us want to return to Japan's work culture. Even before we recontacted Earth, we still had problems getting people to work. This," Shiroe tapped the paper contraption, "was an early effort to solve that problem. Magic can do so many things, but usually needs at least one caster, of a specific class and subclass, to do them."

"Stand back, please."

Shiroe set the device down. He reached into his magic bag and pulled out a staff taller than him in two motions.

An enormous, scythe-like forcefield projected out of the staff.

Yuta took another few steps back for good measure. He'd bought a blinged-out staff for his own use, but man was this making him feel inadequate.

Shiroe gently tapped the contraption with the head of his staff, before de-activating his magic.

The black lines on the paper glowed blue, and a small sphere of light rose from the stacks of paper.

After a few moments, it faded.

Shiroe sighed in… relief? Yuta wasn't sure.

"Good, it didn't malfunction."

"That was Magic Light, wasn't it?"

Shiroe nodded. "I've been working on the theory behind replicating spells without casters. Magic Light was what I worked with first, but more recently I've been working on replicating the magic Fullers use to duplicate material."

"So the goal here is to automate the process of making immortality contracts?"

"From start to finish, yes. We knew we'd never get seven billion contracts out if we had to make them all by hand."

"And the reason you're auctioning off the contracts is to- to buy materials? To pay the Fullers in the interim?"

"To buy supercomputer time and fund research studies. We can use magic, but don't really understand it. The money's necessary to speed up the research and development process."

Yuta hastened to write that down.

"And then? What do you do when you understand how magic works?"

Shiroe smiled and pushed up his glasses.

~oOo~

His daughter's bardic magic hit him like the high from doing a line of cocaine. He felt euphoric and confident, as his fingers flew across his guitar.

Isuzu opened her mouth and began to sing.

They were in separate, soundproof rooms. He could see the other bandmembers on LCD screens, but there wasn't any glass for him to see them directly to avoid the possibility of sympathetic vibrations.

Still, he could hear her voice through his headphones, and the magic was just… wow.

It was like he had absolutely no chance of getting the wrong note or missing a beat, like some part of his brain had been stimulated that allowed him to stay exactly in sync with his daughter, hitting each note with uncanny, machine-like precision, unless he specifically decided to play loose.

Rintaro didn't regret telling his daughter that she didn't have a future in music, but only because that had likely started the butterfly effect that ended with her here, empowered by literally otherworldly magic.

Even if she hadn't been a particularly skillful musician, Rintaro knew that his studio would have still jumped at the chance to record a high-level Bard.

So her increased confidence and skill were both very pleasant bonuses.

They finished the take, miraculously without making a single mistake. Well, maybe not so miraculously.

He was a little disappointed Isuzu hadn't put out more magic, but Isuzu had explained the results would be a little… apocalyptic, if she did.

The idea of a song that could lift freestanding objects across an entire city to serve as an impromptu air defense system was a little ridiculous, but they lived in a ridiculous world.

~oOo~

In her heart of hearts, Isuzu was glad of one thing: that Tohya had seen the WordPress site Minori had inexpertly set up, and removed each and every single giraffe.

She knew Minori pretty well, but still hadn't gotten a satisfactory explanation for her fascination with them.

She leaned slightly forward in her chair as she worked on the cheap laptop she had bought with guild money. Already, several eBay auctions had completed. For the small, magical items she'd listed, the price tag had been mind-boggling. Supply and demand in action, she supposed.

Several of the buyers had messaged her requesting timetables for delivery, and she replied with her best guess based on their locations.

That task complete, Isuzu began the next task on her list: doing her best to link together Log Horizon's sprawling social media presence, eclectic and disjointed though it was.

The room was spacious and well lit by wide panes of glass; her father had done pretty well for himself since the Catastrophe. Instead of a rural area, he now lived in a well-maintained home in Tokyo.

Two solar panels leaned on the mahogany desk. They were too big to fit in her magic bag, but she suspected that Minori could still move them back to the guild house by holding onto them and hoping really really hard they counted as a shield.

And if that failed, they'd just buy some portal time. It was still prohibitively expensive, but if any guild could afford it, Log Horizon could. The merchandising deals had been extremely profitable.

To what seemed like the constant stupefaction of the older Log Horizon members, they'd survived two years without computers. Waiting another day wouldn't be too much to ask.

On a whim, she went on the Log Horizon facebook and indicated she was willing to answer questions live.

She ignored the complicated questions she didn't really have the time (or more importantly, inclination) to answer, but got through about thirty queries before signing off.

That finished, she opened up a manga she had been following before the Catastrophe and began to read.

"Hey, sweetie."

Isuzu looked up, then up some more, leaning back in her chair. She smiled at her dad as she took the opportunity to stretch.

"Hey, dad. What's up?"

"Ah, nuthn' much. Just wanted to spend some time with my daughter. Got anything you'd like to say?"

Isuzu considered the question.

Her mind went blank, and a slightly uncomfortable silence descended over the pair.

"Um, I have a boyfriend now."

Her father started. "You have a _what?_ How did this not come up yet?"

"A… boyfriend?" Isuzu didn't get what her father was so worked up about.

A menagerie of emotions flew across his face, but he eventually settled on a wry smile.

"Well, if he turns out to be a scumbag, your daddy's got your back. What's his name?"

"Rundelhaus."

"That's pretty funny sounding. Is he the blond one in the picture on your website? The- the whatchamacallit, the Easton? Eastalian?"

"Yep."

'Huh. What's he like? What's his family like?"

"Umm…" Isuzu would need to handle this carefully.

"He's loyal and kind. Though to be honest, he's a little, um, dumb." Isuzu blushed. "He's a great guy, though."

"Sound likeable," said her father, noncommittally.

Isuzu chuckled. Rundelhaus was hard to dislike. Everybody loved dogs, so by extension, everybody would love Rundelhaus. He wasn't Wolf Tribe, but he acted more like a puppy, at least in her opinion, than anyone playing that race did.

"I notice you didn't mention his family…"

Isuzu grinned sheepishly. "Well, I haven't met them. He's not on the best terms with his family. I know they're nobility in the Ninetails Dominion, but he doesn't talk about them a lot. I don't think they approved of him becoming an adventurer. That's lowercase A- he was crazy enough to become one despite his handicap."

Her father whistled. "Nobility, huh? Impressive. And it sounds like he's a hard worker. I think I'll like this kid." He squinted, trying but not-quite-succeeding in pulling off the classic, pulp-western mean look. "But he better treat you right, or he'll be dealing with me, and my kickass cavalry sword."

Isuzu rolled her eyes.

~oOo~

A/N:This chapter is Epilougue #1. Luckily for you guys, that means there's a #2 planned. But instead of having it pre-written weeks in advance, I'm doing something a little different.

In a serially published story that went through as many characters and viewpoints as this one, I'm bound to have dropped plot threads, or simply not touched on some characters you'd like to see. So I'll be accepting suggestions for things, people, even events to write about come Epilougue #2. More frequent suggestions have a better chance of being picked, but any interesting suggestion has a shot.


	29. Chapter 29 - Epilogue 2

~oOo~

 _Log Horizon © Mamare Touno_

 _This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978_

 **Chapter 29 - FINAL**

~oOo~

Shoryu's mom had pushed rather hard for him to go back to school. Her first attempt had been rebuffed with relative ease; one heartfelt speech, and she'd folded. Her second attempt had been more difficult to counter, as "if you'd gone to school, you wouldn't have died" was a rather powerful argument. His response had been to deploy an argument centered around how he already had a stable job. She hadn't been pleased, exactly, but he'd gotten out of further education, and as far as he'd been concerned, that was a win.

But in the end, the last laugh was hers.

Because, in his capacity as Crescent Moon's battle team leader, he was required to teach any newbies how to fight.

And in Crescent Moon's capacity as a new player outreach guild, Henrietta had decided it was their solemn duty to instruct all the brand-new adventurers in how to use their powers, preferably before they killed themselves (or each other) doing stupid things.

Personally, Shoryu thought letting them die would serve as a good lesson. But Henrietta had acquired Maryelle's support through a combination of needling and underhanded bribery, and to his endless chagrin, he still wasn't over Maryelle.

So as a result, he still had to go to high school. Or rather, schools. Twenty over a two week period, to dance like a trained monkey in front of hundreds of students. Or less facetiously, to explain the dangers and uses of magic.

He was very much not looking forward to it.

Hien smacked him on the back. "Stop worrying, man. You're pretty much a celebrity. Nobody's going to have the balls to call you out if you get something wrong, and it's not like those starstruck suckers are gonna heckle you."

An uneasy smile forced its way onto Shoryu's face as he tried to psych himself up for public speaking.

He could effortlessly lead a small army, but asking him to talk to a group of people who didn't even hold his life in their hands was too much to ask. Ridiculous.

What had Minori's advice been again? Hadn't she had the exact same problem?

"Stop wasting time. Go get 'em, tiger!"

Shoryu yelped as Hien smacked him on the ass. "What the hell, man?!"

Hien made shooing motions, and Shoryu begrudgingly started walking.

One of the teachers, a hawkish, greying woman, noticed the pair and waved them over.

"Your last minute preparations are complete?"

Shoryu nodded.

"Excellent. It'll be another… three minutes or so until they're ready for you." The woman put her phone away. "In the meantime, would you be willing to satiate my curiosity on a few issues?"

"...Sure?" Man, was it ever weird to see adults three times his age deferring to him.

"First and foremost, what literary traditions do the Landers have? There's unfortunately little information about their culture. I'm aware that their written language is different, but still extremely similar to ours. Did that cause problems with communication or diplomacy?"

"Literary traditions?" Shoryu opened his mouth, then closed it without saying anything. He resisted making a filler noise, as he tried to remember anything useful. "I don't… I'm not really the sort of person to ask about that. I think Nureha of Plant Hwyaden is publishing a compendium of their legends, but I didn't read much back in Theldesia. There was always too much to do…"

"That is a pity. But by Nureha, and I apologize for the digression, you do mean the woman who killed you, no?"

"Well, yes."

"You don't seem to say her name with any malice. Is death truly so trivial, for Adventurers?"

"Not exactly. But she won, if not quite fair and square, then at least in a way I could have and should have prepared for. So really, I blame myself more than her."

"That is an… _interesting_ perspective, certainly. But I believe I have taken enough of your time." She gestured towards the stage, as the school principal wrapped up her introduction of Shoryu and Hien. "Be careful with what you say, high schoolers are not particularly forgiving of even the most minor of stumbles."

"Thank you for the warning. Then."

Shoryu gritten his teeth, rather put off. Hien made a mock salute to the teacher, and the pair walked to the stage.

His nerves getting to him, Shoryu ran up the stairs, taking them two as a time.

The audience wasn't deathly silent, as Shoryu had feared, but the constant, low-level roar of the crowd belied the fact that they weren't paying anything more than the bare modicum of attention. Not unsurprising- Shoryu had snarked his way through many a mandatory assembly.

Nor was it a problem.

"Hien, if you'd do the honors?"

"My pleasure."

Hien whipped out his pre-loaded crossbow from his magic bag, then fired a low-velocity shot over the crowd.

The fifteen minutes of the principal telling the student body to respect their guests had failed to dampen the clamour.

The illusionary firework effortlessly did what she couldn't.

Taking advantage of the shock and awe, Shoryu made his move.

"Hello, I'm here to talk about all the cool things magic can do, and why you shouldn't do them until you're at a higher level. With me is my friend Hien, who'll be serving as the comic relief."

"Hey!"

Shoryu's smile became a little less forced and a little more genuine, as his audience responded with scattered laughter.

"So. Who here has already picked a class?"

~oOo~

"Tetra!" yelled Krusty. "Stop focusing on your music video, and start focusing on making sure my health stays green!"

"But it's not like you're at risk anyways~!"

Krusty ignored her pouty response, as he returned his attention to cleaving apart goblin after goblin.

He wasn't receiving any XP from these low level mobs, of course, but that wasn't the point. And anyways, he'd made it to level one hundred already.

"You're killing them too fast. Slow down."

At Mitchitaka's order, Krusty modulated his swing rate.

With each strike, a goblin was annihilated. Still, their numbers gradually refilled, and their patchy line once again became a dense green wall of monsters.

But the group of four wasn't overwhelmed, due to the simple fact that only a small aperture allowed the goblins to get to the group of four adventurers.

"Time."

Krusty stepped back, as Roe2's construct glided ever so gently forward.

Knowing what was coming, Krusty shut his eyes tight and covered them with his gauntleted forearm.

The world flashed white. Once, twice, three times.

Krusty uncovered his eyes, stepping back up to the aperture. In this case, the size of the hole worked against them- the diffusion of heat had even cooked goblins that hadn't been in the direct line of fire, but almost half of the space remained filled.

But the other half was clear, and that was all they needed.

Michitaka pressed a button, and the aperture dilated, the iridescent surface of the containment magic retracting.

The group waded into the mass of goblins, as Krusty swept aside tides of the annoying little anklebiters in arcing blows of his axe. The ambient mana no longer dense enough to spontaneously spawn new goblins, their numbers fell swiftly.

Once the entire area had been cleared, the group left the containment magic.

"Ugh, being in these things always give me the creeps. If they block telepathy and Call of Home, what's to say they don't block souls going back to the cathedral?"

"The crafting guilds wouldn't let a risk like that go unaddressed, Tetra. Right, Michitaka?"

Mitchitaka looked up from his notebook suddenly, alarmed. "I… well, the thought never crossed my mind."

"Wait, seriously?" Roe2 chimed in.

"We've gotten… a little too used to completely ignoring safety regulations, and all." Roderick chewed on his bottom lip, for a little while, thinking. "Though- at least in this case, anyways- it shouldn't be a concern-. We haven't gotten the spell designs down to the point where they're completely free of leakage."

Krusty blinked. "Then please, please, get un-used to it. Did you at least get the data you needed?"

"Ah, yes. It doesn't look like their- the goblin's, that is- replacement rate is optimal, even if they have a better total mana output than the elementals."

"Aww, so all that work went to waste?"

"Science is never wasteful, if you take care to properly document it!"

Krusty rolled his eyes.

Already, the tiredness and soreness of his body was fading away. In retrospect, that had been an exceptionally calming experience. Sheer violence, without the need for tactics. It had been a little boring, to be sure, but maybe a shorter session could work.

It was a little like meditation, really. The repetitive motions had lead to something of a trance-like state.

He could see it now- therapeutic monster slaying.

Krusty cracked a grin as he wondered whether that could be franchised.

~oOo~

Coppelia absently smoothed down her french maid outfit, resisting the temptation to swap it out for her armor. As she noticed her own nervous gesture, Coppelia stilled her hands. Mentally berating herself for exhibiting such an unbecoming, _biological_ reflex, she tried to clear her mind of idle thought.

A hand gently patted her on the shoulder, and Coppelia turned her head to see Coppelia-Monk looking at her, lips upturned. "Don't worry, it'll be OK."

Coppelia's face remained blank.

Coppelia-Statistician and Coppelia-Lurker tucked away their notebooks as the video call connected. At once, all thirteen of the former bots looked at the screen, to finally behold their creator.

Chen was an unassuming woman, but it was easy to see how they'd been created in her image. Her ears stuck out of her head like radar dishes in miniature, her hair not even trying to obscure them. That same hair, however, conspired to hide her eyes from the camera.

The silence was broken first by Astrid. The berserker spoke in a heavily effected, guttural accent, her outrageously dyed blond-and-purple hair completing the trifecta of things she'd adopted to disassociate herself from her sisters. "We are glad to meet you, mother. My sisters and I have long sought to know you."

Chen seemed rather bewildered by Astrid's declaration.

"I'm… not really your mother. I mean-" she added hastily "-I know I coded you, but I never raised you, or even really got to know you… Do you- any of you remember anything before the Dissapearance?"

Coppelia chimed in, doing her best to ignore what a human might call dissapointment. "System logs held on Coppelia's memory survived the Dissapearance."

"But do you have actual memories of before you became a person?"

"You're asking the Living Automaton here. She _still_ isn't a person, as far as she's concerned," snarked Coppelia-Swashbuckler. "But, yeah, we all remember a little. Like, I remember that one raid all of us took together, where you tried to multibox everyone at the same time. Well, almost everyone." Coppelia-Swashbuckler's half-pitying, half-condescending look might have elicited an emotional reaction from Coppelia, if she were capable of having them.

Coppelia-Monk pushed Coppelia-Swashbuckler away from the screen, perhaps a little more roughly than necessary. "The truth is between their answers. When Coppelia-Support said that we maintain our system logs, she meant that we remember everything that's present on them in the same manner as any other memory, rather than as simple text files."

"But…" Chen looked at Coppelia. "You all mostly just followed pre-programmed macros, like standing in one place and dispensing buffs."

Sensing that that comment had been meant for her, Coppelia tried to reassure her creator. "Coppelia finds fulfillment in enacting her purpose."

"Erm. Moving on, I've noticed that you're all acting pretty differently. Is that because of how your experiences diverged after the Dissapearance, or did you all adopt different personas to make yourselves easier to distinguish?"

"I'll take this question." Coppelia-Statistician moved closer to the screen, as the other Coppelias shifted around her. "From correspondences with each Coppelia, Coppelia has- I mean, I have determined that initial differentiation occurred during the Dissapearance, as each of us adopted different personalities, depending on our memories. From their, our experiences further differentiated my sisters and I from each other."

Chen shook her head. "It's, uh, wow. I'm sorry, I'm being incoherent, but it just never really hit me that you guys were all running around in Elder Tales, even after I stopped controlling you. It's really cool, actually." Chen smiled. "I'm not really comfortable being your mom, but I'm still kind of responsible for you guys."

Chen thought silently for a little while more. Then, slowly, she said, "I guess... you guys can call me auntie." Chen smiled. "How about you tell me about these experiences that 'differentiated' you so much, then? Especially you, Coppelia-Support. I hear you traveled with Krusty, and he's positively _dreamy._ Do you think you could introduce me?" Chen winked.

Coppelia's biology betrayed her again, and her lips twitched into what Adventurers might call a smile.

~oOo~

Role playing was about fantasy. Not about the genre, but about being someone else, even if only for a moment. About living a life the real world didn't allow, even if only on an overburdened hard disk somewhere in a server farm.

For Akatsuki, that "someone else" had been a competent, well-respected ninja.

The Catastrophe had happened, and the illusion had shattered.

New body or not, a few extra inches didn't make up for years of insecurities and self-doubt.

But paradoxically, it had been returning to her old height that had allowed her to re-assume her persona. Because going from female, to male, and back had taught her a lesson that all the prosocial television programs she'd watched as a child hadn't. That it didn't matter what she looked like.

At least, not to Shiroe. Not when he was commanding his fortress like a pianist commanded their fingers. When he fought, she was just another tool in his arsenal. And that was how she liked it- he gave her her purpose, and she gave him her loyalty.

So she was content to wait silently for him to resume speaking. The night would have been more than chilly, but she was nestled into his side and shielded from the cold.

The guild hall was empty, except for them. Only Tetra remained on-planet, for now, and she was, well… Akatsuki cleared her mind. She tried to avoid thinking of Tetra's own romantic entanglements. She didn't begrudge the girl her partners, but Akatsuki's upbringing had been rather more conservative than Tetra's.

"...And after, after we conquer death, and entropy, there's a clear path ahead of us. To- um, too-" Shiroe trailed off. "No, that's too pretentious, isn't it? If I go in front of the UN and talk like that, nobody will take me seriously. I need to tone it down… No, I need to not do this, period. Krusty's a better candidate for the speech; he's always been more bombastic. I should just-"

Akatsuki jabbed him gently in the side. Not enough to hurt, but enough to snap him out of his little depressive episode. "No, Shiroe, you should be the one doing this. Krusty's all about the implementation. We need a visionary. That's _you._ "

Even without looking at his face, Akatsuki knew he was frowning. Shiroe was predictable like that.

"You've said that before, but you're, well, bias- ah!"

Akatsuki jabbed him again. "And you're a worrywart. It'll be fine; you remember that reporter right?"

"Of course! He was so uncomfortable being around me… I think he was offended, or something."

Akatsuki restrained what would have been a short bark of laughter. It was a little funny that he thought that way, but Shiroe had enough complexes without her dismissing his concerns. "Offended? No. _Awestruck_. Shiroe, you have a reputation. You _know_ you have a reputation. I know you still feel like the introverted grad student who spends all his time online, but when people look at you, they don't see that. They see the Villain in Glasses, capital V, capital G. You're a living legend. Keep going, you're doing fine."

She kissed him on the cheek in encouragement, as he squeezed her a little bit closer. Hiding her face once again in the folds of his long, grey coat, she hid her blush. As much as she was playing up the "competent, confident ninja" act, there was still a thrill to her relationship with Shiroe she still hadn't gotten over.

She hoped she'd never get over it.

"...Thanks. So, um," Shiroe cleared his throat. "There's, uh, there's-" Shiroe cleared his throat again, before continuing in a steady tone of voice. Akatsuki smiled; the thrill was present for him, too. "There's a clear path ahead of us. The Travelers have expanded outwards, over and over again. World after world they've found barren of intelligent life. Theldesia, and now Earth, have been the only exceptions. The only one of the thousands, maybe millions of life-bearing words they've discovered with civilization." Shiroe paused to take a sip from his glass of water.

He continued after a moment. "The reason for that has become clear. In fact, it's been clear, all this time. When something like the Catastrophe-" Shiroe stopped, evidently changing his mind. "When something as wildly impossible as the Disappearance happens, we can't blame chance. There's only one conclusion to draw: that an individual or a group- not some sort of natural occurrence- caused it. And we think we've figured out who."

Shiroe's arm twitched, but stayed wrapped around Akatsuki. She smirked. Even just practicing a speech, Shiroe couldn't help but telegraph when he'd push his glasses up.

"Central to our conclusion is the Law of Providence Horizon and the Law of Contradiction. That the barren worlds the Travelers found had been made to be that way. Why would the multiverse so stringently enforce the separation of sapient beings from each other?" Shiroe paused again, but this time Akatsuki knew it was for emphasis. "Limits on computational power."

Another pause.

"Life, by itself, is not too difficult to simulate. Ordinary chemistry is sufficient to simulate the majority of it. But _advanced_ life, like the Travelers, or us, creates superheavy elements. It travels between dimensions. It creates energy sources of infinite capacity. It plumbs the depths of physics, going far beyond the subatomic level. So with that in mind, in tandem with the Travelers and academics from both Japan and Eastal, the Akihabaran Round Table Alliance has concluded that we are living in a simulation."

Another pause, and another sip from the glass of water.

"We're not the first group to say that, of course, but we're the first group to say this: every moment we stay in this simulation is an _existential risk._ Our simulators have shown no qualms in committing xenocide on a massive scale. We don't known why the Law of Providence Horizon has been suspended. And we can't know if it will continue to be. We are on the brink of a post-scarcity, post-death society. No measure is too extreme to preserve that."

Shiroe's voice grew hard, and it was easy to see why so many believed him a villain.

"So the Akihabaran Round Table Alliance recommends the following. That the United Nations invests all possible resources into examining our physical reality, in the hopes that we can find enough frayed ends to unravel the tapestry that makes up the universe. That we find a way to look beyond the substrate we exist on, and interact directly with our creators. That we determine a way to either negotiate our freedom, or eliminate them before they eliminate us."

Shiroe's words trailed off into the night. Then, like a soap bubble bursting, the moment was over. "So, how was that? Did you like it?"

Again, Akatsuki almost laughed. The incongruity of Shiroe's two personas, combined with his perhaps somewhat unfortunate word choice, combined to be rather humorous. But, again, Akatsuki restrained herself. Shiroe's trust in her, his willingness to show her his insecurities, was not a privilege she planned on abusing.

But neither did she plan on being a yes woman.

Akatsuki considered the speech. "Starting from the end, you really have a problem with being… let's say, ominous." Akatsuki gave an internal sigh of relief at narrowly avoiding the word 'gloomy.' "You started off well by creating a utopian picture, but you need to strike a balance between calling people to fight for it, and paralyzing them with indecision because of their own fear. And I think you should drop the part about 'conquering death,' maybe in favor of 'conquering illness,' or something similar. Not everyone is comfortable with immortality…"

The discussion continued well into the night, under Theldesia's gibbous moon.

~oOo~

Morning brought clarity.

She'd gotten drunk.

Again.

Her hands spasmed violently, as Indicus briefly indulged in the fantasy of strangling that _goddamn traitor_ , KR.

Him and his fucking consciousness had ruined everything she'd worked for.

The thought passed, and she collapsed back onto her bed. A torpor overtook her, replacing her violent emotions with blank apathy.

She stared at her ceiling for long enough that the early morning sunlight left, leaving darkness to pool on the ceiling.

A litany of self-recriminations ran through her mind. How she had been stupid to not expect betrayal at every turn. How she'd been too soft on her incompetent subordinates. How she'd expected that playing the political game like an ordinary, rational agent could possibly get her anywhere.

It was fucking rigged, that's what it was. People like Krusty came into the world silver spoon six inches deep in their asshole. Born and bred to take power and control, supported on each side by sycophants and trust funds.

Indicus had nothing but what she'd made for herself. A self-made woman, ruling akihabara's second most prominent faction.

Heh. As if that mattered, now.

Indicus shifted, and her bed creaked. It wasn't a poster bed, like Nureha slept in, but a simle mattress over roughly hewn wooden slats. A servant's quarters.

She didn't mind that. In fact, she preferred it- hubris brought failure. The bed and the room served as reminders.

But the fact remained that she had still, _fucking,_ _ **forgot.**_

Look at her. Moping for weeks on end, because she'd thought she was winning, and then she'd lost. Incontrovertibly.

She was Nureha's mirror image. She was pathetic.

Plant Hwyaden's authority came from its size, and its control of the Cathedral. Absolute power over whether her subjects died then lived, or stayed dead, forever.

But the more people who became adventurers, the less her guild mattered. Indicus could kill each and every person within the wall of Minami, and it would be barely a blip. Hell, it would probably be a favour to the rest of the world. Even as immortals, people just couldn't stop themselves from breeding like animals.

She'd seen the stats. She'd ordered them collected in the first place. Twenty four live births. Two miscarriages. And that was just among Minami's adventurers. Japanese women tended to marry late and bear children later, but even that wasn't stopping the steady increase in the population.

Because there was no longer a death rate.

In the skittering insects that occasionally crawled across her walls, Indicus could see the future. Humanity reduced to nothing more than self-replicating automata, spreading across the universe in a solid wave of bland.

Being special required exclusivity. Nobody would have that in the world Shiroe and Krusty and KR envisioned.

And that she just couldn't abide. Indicus could take any insult, any debasement, so long as what she did _mattered_. Asked to rule from behind, and let Nureha take the spotlight, Indicus hadn't argued. (Much, anyways.) She had never been in it for the fame.

The idea that everything she could do would eventually be rendered unimportant by sheer population numbers physically revolted her.

It made her want to commit genocide.

There, she said it.

Well, thought it, leastways.

It was such a ridiculous plan that Indicus instinctively shied away from it.

Indicus was a head of state, not a supervillain.

But wasn't genocide in the domain of heads of states? HItler, Pol Pot, Andrew Jackson. Evil men for sure, but powerful ones. Influential ones.

Even the mere threat of it had kept the peace in the twentieth century. The world order balanced on the tips of ten thousand nuclear weapons. The Americans and Russians condemned the axis powers, yet were entirely willing to engender a far greater holocaust. And the Americans were arrogant enough to praise themselves for it! The "Pax Americana." Feh.

But… perhaps Indicus could take inspiration from them. She rose into a sitting position, then a standing one. She began to pace.

Akihabara prided themselves on their research and development projects. Well, she'd show them, and solve her problems in one fell swoop. She'd build a weapon. She'd build an _army_.

Indicus would find a way to kill adventurers.

And she'd use it for nothing short of world- no, _universal_ domination.

~oOo~

A/N: And finally, it's over. It's been an interesting ride, and I'd like to take one more chance to thank all the people who helped me make this, and especially my beta Mizu25. I will _not_ be making a sequel to this story; everyone else is free to play in my sandbox, but as I've contrived to make the scale of this story explode towards the end, writing another work would be orders of magnitude more difficult than even this social sci-fi/action-adventure/political intrigue abomination.

I do however plan to write at least one more fanfic in the future, but am not even sure which fandom I'll write for, so that's a little ways off.

I hope you've enjoyed reading this as much as I've absolutely despised every moment toiling away at the keyboard, held hostage by the monster I birthed ;)


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